Monday, April 23, 2012

Creative Spring - leap, jump, bound, vault, bounce, arise, emanate, sprout, surprise...

What an amazing season Spring is when she finally arrives. The sun likes to hide out in March providing an inner chill that feels colder than December. Then one day, after a grey heavy morning, the sun appears and clothing is shed piece by piece until I absolutely have to get the shoes off and the sandals on. Put the socks away and open the windows.

We leave for Paris tomorrow so it’s full-Tilton packing and getting organized today. The clothes are organized, some are in the suitcase and two pieces at the sewing machine.

Sometimes I notice my mind fretting about how I am going to come up with new ideas. What new thing could possibly be done with a t-shirt? Something always seems to show up but that never seems to help in the moment of fretting. Once I let go of that the ‘something’ always appears. In this case I got to experience, once again, that necessity really is the mother of invention.

I purchased a really nice turtleneck my last time in Paris. It perfectly matched a jacket I have but I rarely wore it. The jacket is the perfect weight for Paris in May the the shirt felt too wintery. Once I’d shortened the sleeves to 3/4, cut the neck down and removed the turtleneck it looked much better but now the length seemed too short. What to do?

I picked out the hems on shirt and sleeves with a seam ripper. I took the turtleneck apart and removed a small piece of elastic that was there to give it a nice scrunch. After pressing everything I cut the sleeve pieces into rectangles. Now I had 3 pieces that would go almost all the way around the bottom of the shirt. When I found a scrap of stripe that matched I knew I was good to go.

I stitched the short edges of the sleeve and turtleneck pieces closed, turned and pressed them. These three pieces along with two stripe scraps were arranged with edges overlapping around the lower edge of the shirt and basted down. After a final try on approval the seam is serged and voila a whole new look!


3 comments:

  1. Great save! The top looks great, and now it will see the light of day again. Glad you saw the opportunity within the obstacle.
    Bon voyage!

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  2. Wow, that's so elegant! I'd love to see the shirt before the mods. Do you have a photo? I bet those kicky pleated looking spots are fun when you walk. Hope you are feeling glamorous in Paris when wearing this.

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