January Refashion Month with Lauren from Adventures of Lauren

Lauren from adventures of Lauren, wasn't a total stranger to me, because we were both part from the Refashion Co-op comunity - she's actually one of the editors - but it was only when we competed together at Refashion Runway that I started following her blog and all her creations. During the entire competition, I was amazed at how much creative all my fellow contestants were, and Lauren wasn't an exception. It's a pleasure for me to have her sharing one of her stunning refashions, with a tutorial!

...

I am so excited to apart of the January Refashion Month over at the House of Estrela! I am so excited to share my refashion with you. First off, my name is Lauren and I blog at The Adventures of Lauren. By day I am a scientist studying cancer chemotherapy resistance and during the nights and weekends, I find my creative side with refashioning and sewing.

I really enjoy challenging myself. One year while trying to save some money and unleash my creative side, I gave up shopping only to thrift or sew it myself. This year is no exception. I am setting a goal for 99 refashions and again no more shopping just sewing and refashioning! So 2014 will be a fun year! Here are some of my favorite refashions I have done in the past.

Today I am show what I did with this blue sleeveless button down that I thought I would wear as is. On the hanger it looks great. 

On me not so much....

What's wrong? The neck is too small and I can't button it up.

Too tight in the hips.

There is a funny thing going on in the armholes. They are too big. They open up.

So I need to make these arm holes work for me, add some wiggle room, and fix the choking aspect of the neckline. I wanted something different than adding to the sides of the top, I want to add it to the back of the shirt. So away we go!!!

1. Unpick the neck band with my seam ripper.

2. Fold top in half matching up the shoulder seams and cut away a new neckline. I went right below the first button but above the 2nd (#3).

4. Now we have a new neck. We will finish it tomorrow. 

5.  Mark the armholes on how much need to be taken in. 

                                6. & 7. Sew making sure each side matches. 

8. Measure how long the back is. Mine was right at 26 inches

9. Mark center of back

10. & 11. With filler fabric, mine was black satin, create a triangle using the length. I folded mine in half to make sure I stayed even. The top was around 3-4 inches across to account for seam allowance.

12. After the triangle was done, inhale & exhale and cut straight down the center back of the top.

13. Unpick the top part in order to get the fabric out in order to attach the fabric.

14. Match right sides together and sew

15. To clean up, I serged each side. But if you don't have a serger you can do a zigzag or overcast stitch. 

16. Shows the side on how nicely the satin connected to the blue cotton. It also shows the start of my serging of the shirt bottom but my pictures got mixed up and I'll refer to this later.

17. Pull the fabric through the top placket that we unpicked earlier to pull out the fabric. Now time to put it back together.

18. Sew

19. Done

20. Now to fix the bottom hem. I used my serger to cut off the hem. Alternatively you can cut with scissors and do a hem.

21. Refer back to 16 to see what my bottom hem looked like. Fold over and sew (22). 

24. Now to finish the neckline. I prefer to use the bias tape method to give a clean edge. Helps me keep my sanity. I found a piece of like colored bias tape, in case of any sort of showing. 

25. & 26. Pin the opened bias tape to the right side of the neckline. Sew along the fold. 

27. Fold the bias tape to the wrong side and iron. You should see nice curves. The heat will help you achieve the curves.

28. Top stitch the neckline. You will grab the bias tape. See 29.

30. Now this was longer than usual so I folded under (on the wrong side of fabric).

31. Resew the neckline again. A little farther away. Normally I don't use extra wide bias tape, this instance I needed to accommodate the extra width. 

32.  Done. We have double lines. 

33. I always save the ends for last. Fold the bias tape under

34. Pin and sew

35. Done. Nice clean edge. 

36. Last but not least I did not like the white buttons now that I have a black stripe down the back. I took them off and replaced with black buttons. See 24 for what they look like.

Done! Now I have a shirt that fits me. Something casual to go run errands in.

No more neck hazards here... And fits the hips

Hey check out those arm holes.

Now for the surprise in the back. 

Now for the obligatory cat picture b/c my cats love attention. But it also showcases the fact I have more wiggle room to move with my shirt now.

Hope you enjoyed my little tutorial. I am honored to be a part of this series! Thank you Magda for having me!

Cheers,

Lauren 

Adventures of Lauren 

|Refashion Runway| Week 2: Emerald

Warning: long post, heavy on photos!

For this week's challenge I was a bit lost. I love emerald, but I had refashioned my emerald pieces already (if you're new here, you might want to know I made a challenge of not buying anymore fabric or clothes for this year; - for those who follow for a while, sorry I am mentioning it again). I made a pair of pants for my kid out of a women's pants first, and then I turned a very old and dated dress/skirt/whatever that was, into a lovely mini dress I'm terrible in love with. 

So, I turned into my own wardrobe, hoping to find something with that color. I found the dress I mentioned before, a tank top and a dress I made from scratch a few years ago. It's this one:

The refashioned dress was out of the list. I loved it too much to just refashion it again. This one was an option. I mean, I love it, but I haven't been using it much lately... And that fabric? I love that fabric... I even thought about cheating! AH! I still have lots of that fabric left... but, nope, no way! I couldn't do that even if I wanted! lol

So, I was left with the knit tank top. Now, I have to confess, even though I seldomly sew knits, I fear them. Really! So, I felt dissapointed that it was my only option for the emerald challenge... UNTIL it came to my mind that I still had a box somewhere which held a few more treasures meant for refashioning. YAY! And guess what? I found an emerald and white striped button up shirt! How lucky?!

It was a women uniform's shirt. I believe it came from my sister's in laws, from the time they had a restaurant many years ago (even though this is that old, the fabric is as new, perfect!). Apparently, I had done a few cuts to it already. It was missing a sleeve, all buttons and a scrap was cut on the back. Pffff... what on earth will I be able to do with this?! -  I thought!

I tried to get inspired by playing with the shirt on my dress form. I had fun, and I finally got to somewhere. I wanted a corset looking top, BUT I wanted to save the collar and re-use it too. I then put the shirt around (back to front and front to back), used the collar as a turtle neck and pinned the front, side and back darts. Since my dress form is a bit bigger than I am, I had to do it again with the shirt on me. I even played around with the tank top, I envisioned a dress, using it as the skirt. Then I realised the BIG stain on it and rested the top... not for too long though. 

I'm pretty happy with what I made. I don't sew for myself as often as I did before I became a mom, but everytime I do, I get oh so happy, that there is a little something new, for me, by me. 

I used the striped shirt for most of the piece but I also used a band from the bottom of the tank top to create a band on the waist, that is slightly tighter than the top. I love this effect. Then I cut two smaller stripes and used them as bias tape to finish my arm seams. I added green flower buttons to this that were already in my stash too. I thought about adding a 4th button down the back, but I actually liked the open effect it created without it. 

People, it was my first time using a twin needle. I wasn't quite sure if I should share it but I have to. I felt so stupid and just wondered Why, o WHY, did I wait so long?! I have my twin needle wraped in its original paper since I got my machine (it came with it), and that's well over 10 years ago. I took it out like three times, just to look at it... Who would have thought? Sometimes we're so scared to try something, and then we do, and we just feel stupid that we didn't before. 

I love the details on my new top. I love how the collar looks backwards, with the flower button in the middle. I love the bias tape creating a visual contrast, and I even love my scrappy flower added to the front. This, people, was a happy disaster. 

Well, I might have accidentily cut more than I should while constructing, and I did something really nasty to my top. I felt I had lost it! I cut it right on the front! How would I make up for that annoying mistake? Well, if you can turn something awful into something wearable, you must be able to cover up your mess. And that's what I did, of course! So, I just closed the hole with a few stitches, I didn't even bother to make them all pretty, I was going to cover them anyway. I used very small scraps to made a fabric braid, and from there I made a flower. Stitched it on top of the mess and my top became even cuter!

It was a fun sew for me. Then hubby and I had a lot of fun getting those photos taken. It was something we used to do a lot together before any babies arrived, and we felt old and untrained for this right now, but in the end, I think we got a few good ones. 

Oh, and did you recognise the pants I paired it with?! Yes, they are the no sew refashioned pants I showed you back in July!

Now, go to the Refashion Runway page, check what my fellow contestants did with the emerald theme, enjoy and vote for your favorite, please. 

The Bumblebee Tunic

In my previous post, I shared a few pictures of the tunic I made using the Bumblebee dress pattern. I was thinking about doing the "view A" version of the pattern at first, I even cut the fabric for the sleeves, but then I got thinking. This was my niece I was going to make a dress for. mmmm... a dress with ruffles on it. Ok, wait! I couldn't make a dress with ruffles for that 6 year old tom boy... I swear to you, she's worth than boys playing football, she's got a bulky voice, much too bulky for her small body, she doesn't play with dolls... so... you get the point. Don't get me wrong though, when she wants to, she likes to dress really girly... but no ruffles! So, I changed my mind about the desing half way the cutting. 

Since the days are still burning hot over here, and she likes tunics, I decided to make her one. This pink fabric was perfect for her. She likes pink unlike myself. This fabric was in my stash for a while now, mother-in-law gave it to me... but do I have to say it again? I don't like pink (you wouldn't tell according to my latest posts right?!). 

Anyway, I don't exactly know what material this fabric is made of, but it is a light, a little creasy, and fresh. When I chose to go for the tunic, I hesitated for a few seconds, if I'd use the lining or not. It was late and all I wanted was to get it done so I could take it with me the next day and have her modeling it. 

We had a quick photoshoot just before I had to leave... she didn't even change the shorts she was wearing while playing out, and she wasn't wearing shoes... But you get an idea of how it looks on my just turned 6 year old. She wore it out with leggings the evening before. 

Changes I made... I've left the sleeves off, used buttons on the front and used a single piece as back, I skipped the folded seam and I sewed a narrow short zig-zag to finish. And, I also used 3 buttons to close the bodice. And, of course, I added seam pockets (see tutorial here) on the sides. They turned out a little bit too small for her hands, but are cute anyway. hehehe I don't know if you can tell by the picture, but those buttons are pinapples I happened to have in my buttons stash for a few months too. 

|day 23| Refashion Month Guess: Melissa from Melly Sews

Melissa's blog, Melly Sews, must be one of those blogs I follow for years and can't get enough. Not only does she refashion, but she shares a lot of sewing tips, tutorials, blog tips... And, do I need to mention she's the owner of Blank Slate Pattern Shop? I'm pretty sure you've heard or used her patterns before, right?!

 

Hello House of Estrela readers! I'm Melissa, from Melly Sews, and I love to refashion. I didn't realize how much until I started looking through old blog posts to find refashioning posts I've done. So I'm so excited to be here during Refashion Month.

So, click on any picture to go to the post and see some of my favorite refashions.