Shirt finished

The stripe blouse is completed. Sorry its only a hanger shot at the moment, I will try and wear it soon.

The last bits were to add 5 teal buttons on the front and 3 smaller ones on each cuff. The buttonholes are in white thread but the buttons sewn on with teal.

I also added some tiny teal green beads on the chest embroidery, at the tip of the flower petals. I did not add beading to the cuff, as I thought it might be annoying when wearing to work.

I decided that this was a good point to stop and not do anymore beading, as it can be easy to go OTT with embellishments and I just wanted a twist on the menswear shirting with a few feminine touches, but to still keep it as a work suitable item.

Blouse has sleeves

Tonight I managed to get the sleeves into the shirt in a satisfactory manner. Each sleeve has been inserted 3 times but I am finally happy with the result.

I struggled to get the sleeves in last time I made this shirt as well so there is an obvious issue with the alterations to the pattern which I need to address in future.

Anyway this was an idea from Jenni (YorkshireLass) on how to get the sleeves eased in. It is a strip of very thin knit, sewn to the seam allowance instead of gathering stitches which pulls the sleeve head nicely into shape and makes sewing it in easier. (see lower picture for how this works).

The shirt still needs buttonholes and buttons adding but its 11:30pm on a Friday night, so I will tackle that another day when I am fresh(er) .

Stripe blouse sewing

Today I made the collar stand, attached it to the collar, attached the collar to the blouse and topstitched.

I had to have a couple of goes at sewing the collar to the blouse becuase I kept catching little bits, but after a few unpicking sessions got it to lie down.

It's starting to really looks like a shirt now.

Stripe blouse sewing

I made the collar for the stripe blouse today, did not get to the stand but I guess even 30 mins of sewing is better than none.

Work is busy still, and I watched Project Runway on Sky1. Bathtime now :-)

blouse progress

After finishing off some extra work this evening, I did manage an hour of sewing which resulted in the blouse having front bands and a bit of a press of the seams, plus the interfacing applied to the collar and collar stand. I can see it is going to be quite a slow process at this rate.

Stripe blouse sewing

I have had McCall's 5522 cut out for 4 weeks or more now, but finally got sewing it up today.
I managed to sew up the main body in about an hour and a half, and so am going to call it quits for tonight, but thought you might like to see my progress.

If I do half an hour or more each night I should be able to make a good deal of progress by the weekend. I am not travelling with work this week (as far as I know) and currently have no evening work planned either, so I am hoping that I will get sewing time most evenings.

I will share progress each day :D