Thriftin' Thursday

Thursday, January 24, 2013

I love going to thrift stores. Sometimes I find gems, sometimes I find turds. But even a turd can be polished into a sparkling gem! All you need is an imagination, a clothes pin and a sewing machine. Quick projects for me are making over thrift store turds. This one here was a little challenging because it was about 5 times too big.

First thing I did was cut out the sleeves. Sleeves are my nemesis so I hated doing this because I knew they'd be a bitch for me to sew back in. But I sucked it up and grabbed the scissors. I then tried it on and figured out how much I needed to take in the sides. I took in each side 3 inches and it was still a little big and prego looking. I decided to use elastic to gather the waist to make it more defined. I marked off where my waist hit on the shirt, measured out my elastic the size of my waist, pinned the elastic to my shirt matching up to my chalk line then started my machine and hoped for the best. While sewing the elastic I gently pulled on it so it would gather up (if that makes any sense at all).

I then tried my sleeves on and pinned how much I needed to take in. I also had to adjust the armholes because they hung way past my shoulders. I just marked where I wanted them to hit on my shoulder then cut away the excess. I found a good tutorial here on how to do that, pretty easy actually. Sorry I forgot to take pictures. Shoot me. I debated on if I even wanted sleeves, really only because I didn't want to sew them back in - I sensed a hissy fit coming my way - but the majority vote on my Instagram pic was sleeves and it definitely looked better with after I shortened them about 5 inches. I didn't mess any with the length of the shirt because I wanted a tunic look. I need more longer shirts to wear with skinny pants and boots. For some reason when I wear skinny pants I want my butt fully covered. Oh and I almost forgot the best part. I didn't like the look of the collar so I just pinned it on the inside, sewed around the neckline and turned it into a facing!