Blue, Blue...Old Blue Jeans (Uh-huh)

I have worn blue jeans for almost a bajillion years. True story. As the ’south side’ of me expanded sometime between Thing 1 and Thing 2 (and thereafter totally gave up the ghost after Thing 3), I’ve outgrown many a pair. Depressing. But because I have always worn my jeans all the way through the year - yep, even in summer - they have always been a staple item in my wardrobe and thus I was never really concerned with spending up to $80 per pair, as I knew I’d get tons of wear out of them.

However.

Now I can’t bear to throw those stacks of old jeans out. I must have at least ten full size adult pairs and a few children’s pairs to boot. Some I could donate (and still might) but other pairs have minor holes and are unsuitable for that, so I was thinking about recycling them into something in the new year, but I don’t know what. All the tutorials I can find online centre around the very, uh, trendy ‘back pocket change purse’ or ’seat of pants handbag (purse)‘ trains of thought. That might be fun under normal circumstances but I’m also completely useless with installing zippers. And I doubt I’m going to need more than one each of those.

So, I’m relying on you, oh fountains of knowledge, to help me come up with some ideas. I’ve considered a jean quilt but I know if I go to all the trouble of cutting out millions of squares of denim I’ll probably lose interest when I could have used all that fabric in one bigger piece to make something unique. So before I cut anything, I’m gathering the info. The only stipulation is that the project be relatively easy. I can normally fudge my way through the basic level tutorials but essentially, the easier the better :)

Help!