Refashioned Spring Outfit

I haven’t had time for much crafting lately. But I found just enough time to fashion a new outfit.

So I had this navy shirt, its a good fit, three quarter sleeves. But it had a logo from a former job on the left side. I tried appliquéing over the embroidery but it looked terrible. So I pulled that off, and tried something new. I came up with this:

 

I sewed some of these fabric flowers—in the car (thats how easy they are) as we drove across the state to visit family--And then I hand sewed the flowers onto the shirt.

(Since we were on the road, the only place I got a photo was in the car)

Its been through the wash now and everything stayed secure, hooray!

 

I wanted to refashion the navy shirt so that I could wear it with this skirt I whipped up. It came from this lovely little number, Bought at Old Navy extra clearance clearance sale:

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XL weird tube top/one shoulder knit jersey dress, with floppy wingy sleeve. Yuck. But I loved the print navy and white print. So I cut it straight across the middle and added an elastic waistband.

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And ta da, I had a super comfy skirt, and for cheap, $3.00.

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So if you have a shirt with an old ugly logo, a few scraps of fabric, and a not so hot dress you’d like to cut up and turn into a skirt…you can whip up a new spring outfit too!

Refashion: Grey & Blue Dress

I took this clearance XXL dress and took in the sides and waist. Took it up inches and inches in the shoulders. Re-cut the sleeves and reattached them.

I’m still playing with how to make the pockets better. Thinking I’ll add a pleat to them, so they don’t gape open as much. Or maybe some shirring. We’ll see.

And now I have a super comfy simple dress, that fits! And for about $3.00, and an hour of tinkering.

Here’s me and my hubby after church on Valentine’s Day (wish I had a few fabric flowers pinned on too, forgot):

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Navy Stripe- Shirt Altering

So good ole’ Old Navy had another 50% off clearance sale. (Thank you Jenni, my girl on the inside, for the heads up). I went and picked up a few more things to refashion, and I’ve been working of my other works-in-progress too.

So this one isn’t a true refashion. All I really did was resize it.   (Cost= $2.49)

 

However, I completely took it apart to do so. Mostly because of the neckline- love this style. Don’t know what its called, anyone know? I decided to take it up in the shoulders to make it fit better, higher, and less saggy. A few inches makes a big difference. (pinned:)

This is what the inside construction looks like (inside out). Front and back pieces overlap to create the shoulder seam where the sleeve is attached. So I trimmed/ripped out the shoulder seams and side seams. I then overlapped the flaps more and stitched them in place.

Then I tried a new way of attaching sleeves, which is the EASY way! Sew the shoulder seams, flat, then sew up the side seam and sleeve seam in one pass. Really good tutorial here, its worth checking out! I’ll never do set in sleeves the hard way again, unless I have to. The sleeves were already perfectly finished, I just had to unstitch the bar stitch that was keeping them tacked up. I always need more long sleeve shirts, my arms get cold easy, so I’d prefer to have them long instead of leaving them rolled up. Oh and they were a bit wide, so I took them in as well.

I usually try to get by with using as few pins as possible, but this knit tended to roll up on the edges. Also, I wanted to get the stripes lined up as best I could.

   Then finish up with a twin needle hem.  The neckline turned out pretty good.The alterations were pretty effective. 

I’m thinking about adding a stencil. I really like the sailor feel of the navy and white stripes. So I  was thinking along the lines of the Navy theme, I’d do an anchor.

What do you think? Too Cheesy?

Which color? (these are just photoshopped to get an idea)

 

Indecisive some more

So, I got this basic Old Navy shirt in the sale last week. Its my favorite kind- long sleeve, perfect comfortable neckline, basic. Its great….but…I just love these freezer paper stencils, and I can’t just leave it plain. (hey, at least its not a bedazzler!)

So I don’t remember now where I plucked this picture from, but I just love the flower design.

And sometime ago I thought, hmm that would make a great stencil.

Just add a little photoshop/corel draw time and viola:

 

  

So the background is the approximate color of the shirt that I want to stencil, (turquiose?). The color squares to the right are the paints that I have right now: black, green, pink, brown, white, navy, orange.

So because I’m a indecisive nerd, and because it was so easy, I made these different color combinations.

      

Which do you think I should do? Suggestions?

Hoping to do this project this weekend. I’m on a craft kick.

Black Sweater fix up

While I was back home at Christmastime, I found an old sweater of mine. (Remember back in Junior High when dusters sweaters were totally “in”). Well, its still a great sweater, but the sleeves were all stretched out- drove me crazy!

So I turned it inside out and took in the sleeves with a straight stitch- drastically at the wrists. (I think I might take in even more up to the elbows.)

Then I trimmed off the excess. And zigzagged the seam to reinforce and contain the raw edge(don’t need no stinkin serger…well someday I do want one, but for now my machine has some stitches that mock serge).

I also added a big black button. I had a horrible time sewing a buttonhole, but it does the job okay. I can wear it with or without the tie now.

(awful picture of myself) Well, a simple fix up. But something I never used to be able to do.

Twin Needle

Yay! I now have a twin needle.  (two actually, 2.0mm and 4.0mm) You need a twin needle to get that finished look on the hems of knits/clothing, like this:

 

I am really excited, using it should make the things I sew look more finished, less homemade. And it should help them last longer. Plus, my machine has a lot of stitch settings for a twin needle, I’ve been wanting to try them out. Decorative stitches that should work well with it too. I have no experience sewing with one, but I am excited to test it out.

Shirt Refashion/Ruffle Top 1

So I absolutely love a lot of tutorials for ruffle tops I’ve seen on some of my favorite sewing blogs. This is just the first variation I was able to try. The main tutorial I used is from the homemade by jill blog, and this tutorial too from Make it and Love it. 

So I took a shirt I liked the fit of and traced around it, I used the back of some Christmas wrapping paper…worked awesome by the way. (Next time I’ll leave even more room for seams, etc). Just turn inside out, and tuck the sleeves inside to trace.

(I apologize, the lighting in the pictures is terrible, it was dark of night.)

This was the original shirt. XXL and really drapey.

This is the shirt laid out flat. Lots of material to work with.Then, I cut all the seams apart. And then I used the pattern pieces I made earlier to cut out the parts of the shirt.  Sew side and shoulder seams

With the sleeves sewn in.

Time for the ruffle part!  I used elastic thread. You hand wind the elastic thread onto the bobbin, and use regular thread for the top thread in your machine. Then just run a straight stitch down the middle of your fabric.
I cut two widths (1 & 3/4 inch and 1 inch) of fabric from the leftovers I trimmed off the original shirt. Then I layered the wider one underneath the narrower strip and fed them through my sewing machine.
And it was like magic, seriously. Perfectly spaced ruffles came out the other side!   So much easier than basting, pulling threads, having those threads snap, sewing it again, and then spreading to out evenly.

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Then I sewed the ruffle to the neckline, and viola!

Here’s me wearing it on Thanksgiving!