The Newest Now, Completed

...and relatively quickly for me.

Here are a couple of quick shots from within the Sewing Cave. First, the overall garment view:

Then this one, which shows more detail of the collar and buttons. More crystals, clear this time.

I've made and written about the TSW Now Shirt several times now. As designed, the torso is short so I typically add 2"-3" inches in length. I just chalk the extra onto the fabric right before I cut out the pieces.

Another Now Shirt, Modified

Since I'm on staycation and can set my own schedule, I started another project yesterday afternoon after finishing up the TSW Liberty shirt. Yet another Now Shirt, but this time I changed the collar for a different look. I substituted  the Tuxedo shirt  collar from this 1997 book by Sandra Betzina:

As luck would have it, the pattern piece fit the neckline without requiring any redrafting. But oh boy, did I have difficulty with attaching this collar! I actually made this shirt when the book first came out, and it was a favorite. In spite of all that, I could not decipher the instructions, even with my notes:

So I improvised, which required more handwork and a later night than I intended. But the collar is attached and I'm ready to go. Here is the work-in progress so far:

Collar detail:

As you might have guessed, I'm on a little bit of a deadline with this one as I would like to wear it for the Halloween/Dia De Los Muertos season. I found this fabric as my friend Melisa's store this summer when she hosted Material Girls. Unlike a lot of holiday fabrics, this one is good quality and I don't think it's too over the top. I will actually wear it other times.

After all, if a bat print is good enough for Marc Jacobs, how can I go wrong? And my fabric is prettier IMO.

Liberty IV--Complete!

The results are in, and the themed buttons are the winner! However, I've decided to go with the second choice, the red crystals. I really like the theme buttons but in the end, I decided that they should be a feature when I use them. I'm envisioning a solid color shirt in a Southwestern color like turquoise or rose. I do appreciate all the feedback though, it really helped me think about what I wanted to do!

I had to take a little break from the shirt due to fall cleanups. DH had the carpet cleaner in and of course, that meant everything in the house got moved around and then had to be reorganized.

I am taking a little staycation this week with my last two unscheduled days of the year, so I had some time yesterday to finish it up.

The completed garment:

Collar detail:

Front with buttons:

In real life, the buttons are a little bit more colorful and more sparkly. As I mentioned before, the themed buttons are great but I wanted something a bit more quiet. 

Oh, and pardon the cat fur. The perils of a black shirt with a white cat in the house! I will get a picture of me in the top as soon as I am able, but I assure you that I am happy with this look. It looks better on me than on the form which is always a good thing.

Coldwater Creek Handwork

I'm a fan of the knit shells that Coldwater Creek used to make, but the necklines are worse for wear after several seasons. I've already experimented with one of them by trimming the neck with lace. After wearing it a few times, I regard it as a mixed success. The top is wearable again. However, the neckline is a bit stiff and gaps a little. Nothing that a non-sewist would be likely to notice, but I do.

I have 4 others, but I didn't want to use lace again due to the results last time. So I arrived at another idea--how about a crochet edge? Although I learned how to crochet in junior high and made many projects, it's been years since I've actually done any. So I bought some crochet thread, pulled out the hooks, and started experimenting.

Here are the results on the first two:

I'm pretty pleased with how they came out. The crochet edges look nice and are more flexible than the lace. And these took less time, too! Here are some close ups:

The edging on the blue top was done with Aunt Lydia's Classic 10 lace-weight cotton thread. The closest match I could locate was a variegated color called "Ocean". It consists of 2 rows; the first is a foundation and the second is a basic picot.

The edging on the cream top was done with Aunt Lydia's Fashion 3 super fine cotton. I selected this one because it had the best color match. It's thicker, so I just made the foundation row on this one. There's also a slight sheen that the thinner thread doesn't have.

I still have 2 of these tops left, and the biggest challenge was finding threads that coordinated! I had no luck among the crochet threads, so I expanded my search to embroidery floss, where there is a much larger variety of colors to choose from.

In other news,  you probably noticed that I updated the blog a bit. This is a "dynamic" template, which is a bit different from the last one. The sidebar is the little black line along the right side of the page. Hover over it and everything that was here before appears. Still a work in process...

Liberty III--Progress and Auditions

I'm continuing to work on the shirt in fits and starts, although it doesn't look all that different  because I've been working on the facings. There's topstitching but it's lost on the black background.

Meantime, I'm auditioning the button collection for suitable closures. I end up doing this a lot since digital photography is so easy and you can refer back to it again and again. I took these with my phone since it was already out and ready to go. After sorting through several boxes, here are the finalists:

Do I go with the theme?

Or select something that coordinates and blends?

And would red crystals or utilitarian tan be better?

Or something with more contrast? Blue perhaps?

I've already rejected black because it's just too plain. Which one would you choose?