Day 1:

I got so much done today and am quite proud of myself! I could not believe how quickly the flashback skinny tee whipped up! It helped that in my last sewing machine mastery class (for my amazing Bernina! ) they taught us how to sew with knits- which stitches to use and how to adjust the presser foot tension. That made the tee an easy project. Based on Oliver’s measurements, I made him the 24 month size (adding 1 inch in length) to begin with, but I didn’t want to make any more until he tried it on for fit. I used the existing hem for the sleeve which made it an even quicker sew!

Since that project went super fast, I still had time before nap time was over, and I sewed up a pair of quick change trousers for baby bro. The red side matches with Oliver’s tuxedo parsley pants, and I hope that I get a chance to have the boys wear the pants together because I think that would be super cute. The other side is just a fun multi-colored stripe that I have been eyeing as pants for Oliver but thought they might be a bit too crazy.Thankfully you can get away with a bit more on a little baby! I made the size 0-3 months, but I didn’t have quite enough red denim left so they are a bit short. I just won’t roll up the cuff and I think they’ll be fine.

The 24 month tee ended up *just* fitting Oliver (really too small for his head but we made it work) so I knew I would need to make the 2T size if I want the shirts to last more than just a few weeks. He got to bed pretty early last night, and I couldn’t stop thinking about finishing the shirts, so I went ahead and made the 2T size last night… this pattern is addicting! I figured out how to salvage and reuse the existing neck ribbing because I only have gray ribbing, and I have discovered that if I don’t use ribbing, the neck openings are too small to fit over Oliver’s head. Happy to report that the 2T fits great! And I can’t believe how professional this shirt looks! Yay me . Oh I must explain one thing, these are my hubby’s old shirts, and he loves them dearly. I find the green shirt to be a bit disturbing (especially on my 2 year old), but I needed something that I didn’t care about that much to check fit with and it makes hubby happy to give new life to his old shirts, so I guess everyone wins… just no one in blogosphere freak out that I’m encouraging my son to go after animals…he’s quite in love with animals actually.

Day 2:

Oliver is in major need of some dressier shirts so I thought I would see about remixing the flashback tee into a button down shirt. I really had no idea what I was doing, but since I was using one of Ian’s old shirts, I figured I had nothing to lose. I also used Oliver’s short sleeve dress shirt as a general guide to how this shirt needed to come together. I added about 1.5″ to the shirt width on the 2T size FST. It was so cool to use the existing hem and button placket and see the shirt come together. I even seam-ripped the old pocket and cut it down to size.

The only tricky part of this shirt was the collar, and up until I did it, I really had no idea what I was going to do. I cut off the entire collar section from the old shirt, sewed it onto the new shirt, and then folded and sewed the actual collar down to make it a bit smaller. It works, but I kinda forgot that you can see the seams on the shirt inside when the collar isn’t buttoned and they are a bit messy there. I’ll have to figure out something else when I try this again. On a side note, all my other seams look great because I finished them off nicely! Oh and I thought the collar would be too big, but for some reason the toddler neck size was the same as the adult neck size…hmmm.

I waited to finish off the sleeve hem until he tried it on after naptime so you’re seeing the shirt without a sleeve hem but with everything else finished. We are doing really low-key photo shoots this week since most of my time will be spent sewing and I (hopefully) will have lots of finished projects to report to you. I was also pretty happy that this shirt only took me about 90 min from start to finish. I’m pretty sure I will be even faster the next time. Let me tell you, I breathed a huge sigh of relief when Oliver tried the shirt on and it fit! The shoulders are a teensy bit tight but everything else is perfect with a bit of room to grow! Now I’m on to scour through Ian’s clothes and see what else I can re-purpose. This gets addicting, I tell you.