Sunday, February 8, 2009

Birthday Shirt Finished



With at least 2 minutes to spare. We have earned our jello shot...
We were supposed to be at the birthday party at 430p. I was sewing on the last button of the birthday shirt 5 minutes before we left (as usual, I always finish everything at the very last possible minute. I don't know how I do this. This would be a very stressful habit if I were a bomb defuser.)
Here's the shirt, modeled by the birthday boy over his sweatshirt.
It is actually warm enough today to wear it.( over 50 degrees at least)
This is a basic casual shirt pattern, but I deviated two places from the instructions. The yoke and the collar pattern pieces instruct you to place them on the lengthwise grain, but that would have made the design sideways on the collar and yoke and would have looked distracting, so I placed them on the crosswise grain instead. This made the pattern blend better.I do this all the time and it works fine. Don't be afraid of making your own grain decisions if the shirt calls for a change. The pattern is only the rough draft; you are the "decider", (if I may borrow that from W). In the past I have placed the collar and the sleeves and the yoke on the bias and all was well. They just take a bit more care so you don't stretch them. Go ahead and experiment. Nothing is going to blow up, after all.
Here's a shot of his quilt from the birthday 2 years ago. These are his favorite colors, and they all play nicely together with college pictures printed on printable fabric in the nine patches. The pictures are printed on EQ Printables and are still soft and unfaded after 2 years of use.The lap quilt is backed with dark brown minkee and is super soft.

I want to make one for myself, now that I have fulfilled my birthday obligations.
Mr. Hunting Creek is making sad faces today, because he loved DBIL's shirt and he says he doesn't have a new shirt for spring casual day. My son is also whining about the speed of my shirt output. They are under the impression that this is a sweatshop. There was almost a marital incident when it was commented that "you used to sew much faster before". You mean before I had two jobs, two kids, a house, a garden, two dogs and a husband? Those were the days...
Happy Sewing!

3 comments:

cidell said...

You've opened up a can of worms with a well made shirt! I love the term 'marital incident'. Perfect.

Gretchen the Household Deity said...

The shirt came out great, and I love that quilt. I can imagine how warm and snuggly it is backed with minky.

Stephanie Brown said...

I love 'marital incident' too--and I've also been enjoying the vintage instruction manuals and recipes! My mother in law actually has and still uses a product tie-in cookbook from the 1950s (Swan's Down? Calumet? something like that) that came from her mother. The recipes are easy and reliable and (if you stay away from the ones that read like historical documentation from another culture) good. Thanks for making me think of that. (And thanks for the phrase.)