2 New Skirts

Ever since Pattern Review announced the Travel Wardrobe contest, I have been sewing up a storm.  Helping my motivation was an actual trip I have planned...to Mexico!  This contest was a great opportunity to finally sew up some things I have been thinking about for a long time.

First up was a refashion.  I purchased this Target brand, halter top, maxi dress at Goodwill for $3.  I liked the colors and patterns and knew it would be a simple transition from dress to skirt.

I forgot to take a photo prior to cutting it, but here you can get the idea.  I determined what length I wanted the skirt, added about 1.5" and cut!  Simply folding and stitching down a casing, and adding a length of elastic was all it took.  A 15 minute skirt!  :)

The next skirt I made was McCall's 6654:

Link

This pattern is a fantastic choice for easy knit skirts.  There are multiple lengths and either a straight or flared option.  I made the straight skirt using some striped ITY fabric purchased from Denver Fabrics:

Source...(sorry sold out)

I had initially thought of using this fabric to make a maxi dress from McCall's 6559 which was the #5 PR Best pattern in 2012.  After stewing on this idea for several months, I accepted the reality that I don't wear dresses very much, and a skirt would get more wear than a dress.


Here is the finished skirt:

Prior to cutting, I experimented with the stripes to determine which color stripes should be at the widest part of my hips.  As a definite pear shape, I was concerned about wrapping the widest part of my body in horizontal stripes.  Locating the darkest purple and raspberry stripes at my high hip was the most pleasing to me, after extensive raising, lowering, and flipping the fabric top to bottom.  I had plenty of fabric to match the stripes and (I must say), I did a great job :)

Next up is the tops I made to go with my 2 skirts...

  

PR Sewing Bee Round #2

I advanced to Round #2 of the PR Sewing Bee.  This week's challenge (and I do mean challenge) was to use men's button down shirts to make a garment for an adult.  I had a number of my husband's dress shirts in the "Refashion" pile which are no longer suitable for corporate wear. 

I chose one lavender and one dark purple shirt and after racking my brain for quite some time, decided on McCalls 6286 (now OOP).

I used the lavender shirt for the front, back and sleeves. The dark purple would be the collar and button band.

I had a rough time fitting this top.  I cut a 14 and did a 1" FBA creating a bust dart.  It was a little snug so I cut my pattern apart again and made it 1.5".  This made everything worse.  My muslin fit better than this:



Dear God...Avert your eyes!

I ripped out the bust dart and pointed it up toward the apex but wow...what a mess!

Long story short: the fit was horrible.  If it wasn't for the contest, this would have gone right in the re-recycle pile. 

Once I put it on, it looked like a waitress uniform, or worse, a bowling shirt. 

Contest entry photo

The collar was pretty though:

I split the raglan sleeve into a 2 piece sleeve, and made my own piping to highlight the seam which came out nice (even though it added to the waitress vibe):

The back didn't even look good:

Needless to say I did not advance to Round #3 with this atrocity.  Oh well.  On to more exciting things.

A Refashion: From Dad's Golf Shirt to Girl's Golf dress

My husband is rather fussy about his golf shirts.   I had purchased a few at Marshalls for $13 and they were quickly rejected as not being soft enough.  Rather than taking them back, I put them into the refashion pile thinking that I could trim them down to my size.  This morning, my youngest was trying to find something to wear to the first day of golf camp and was very upset when I insisted she could not wear her one collared dress because it was dirty (it was worn yesterday).  So the little wheels in my brain began to turn.  Could I turn a men's size L shirt into a girls dress?  Of course I could!!  In fact, I could use 2 shirts and make it into a more interesting girls golf dress!

I started with 2 identical shirts: one white and one light blue shirt (tags still on):

 

I forgot to take a 'before' photo before chopping off a sleeve :)

I started by cutting off the sleeves and cutting up the side seams of the shirts keeping the shoulder seam intact.  I marked the center line on the front and back and then I pulled out my trusty Jalie 2566 tee shirt pattern.  I cut out the front and back from the white shirt and cut the sleeves and skirt from the blue shirt.  

I gathered the skirt, keeping the original hem and sewed it to the bottom of the shirt.  To add a little more interest to the sleeves, I cut a white band and used the "Refrew techinique" of serging the bands to the bottom of the sleeves so there was no hemming!  

I swapped out the original wood-like buttons for some light blue & white ones from my button stash.  

Ta da!

A closeup of the front:

This took less than 2 hours from start to finish.  I hope she likes it!!

Corduroy Shirt Refashion

During my last stop at Goodwill, I went in search of things to chop up and refashion.  I found this promising beauty:  A size XL J.Jill brown corduroy shirt.  Holding it up to me, it was clear that she was going to find a new life as a skirt for me!  I could even keep the original hem!

Once it was washed and dried, I pulled out my trusty McCalls 3830, and started cutting up the top.  I shifted the zipper from the back to the side and kept one of the original side seams.  After a little fitting and tweaking, it went from this:

TO THIS!:

A new skirt, and no hemming!  There's still a little wonkiness at the bottom of my zipper (best seen on the back view photo on my right hip near my hand), but I'm very happy with my first real re-fashion result!