Saturday, May 30, 2009

How many is too many?

I mentioned that Kisha and I went to 4th Street on the Friday of Memorial Day weekend, and I did a little restocking of the stash. A little meaning 13 yards, and now, less than a week later, only 7 yards of that is left.

How did I blow through 6 yards of fabric in 5 days? Simple. It's finally getting warm and Mario doesn't have very many short-sleeved shirts that aren't of the tee or polo variety.

Let's just say, he does now.

KwikSew to the rescue, once again. Same old pattern, just the shorter sleeve. His favorite part about these three shirts? Pockets.

When I make dress shirts, I generally "forget" to add the pocket. (Or, depending on the design, I just flat out refuse to add the pocket). This time, since these are casual shirts, he gets no argument for his burning need of pockets to cram random bits of paper into; honestly, he's as bad as a 6 year old with the stuff that ends up in there. I keep expecting to find a toad, or bits of string, or rocks, when I put a load of shirts in the washer.

He got his pockets; I got to do them my way. I added a button/buttonhole to make it vaguely more interesting. He thinks it's cool, I'm just glad he didn't object because all 3 were done before he was consulted.

The first shirt, top left, was finished in time for Sunday's family cookout. The fabric reminded me of a vintage Hawaiian shirt. The next two are more contemporary fabrics. There's also one other difference between the first shirt and the next two: for the first shirt, I cheated.

And it bothers me, even though only I will probably notice. KwikSew's shirt pattern comes equipped with two collars, the standard collar with separate stand, and a combination collar-and-stand piece. I hadn't tried that before, and I did this time, mainly to see what it was like but also thinking that I could just blow through these shirts if I could find a way to speed up the collars (without cuffs and sleeve plackets, the collar is the only time-consuming bit left).

Be warned: shortcuts don't always get you where you want to go. And the collar-to-band sewing isn't the pain in the butt; it's the band-to-shirt that's the real pain, and that still has to be done. And I swear the shortcut collar didn't fit as well. It did once I picked it loose and did it a second time, but still . . . I should have done it right the first time. I shouldn't have cheated.

The sewing gods let me know that.

It looks okay in the photograph. It actually looks a bit better than that, this was taken at the end of the day after he'd been standing at the grill, so it was a little wilted. But it doesn't have the body of a "real" collar, even with proper interfacing, and if I had enough fabric left, I would pick this non-collar off and replace it with one that didn't bother me every time I looked at it.

Good thing there's a statute of limitations on sewing mistakes. Whatever oops or shortcut or misdeed is bothering you right now, within a week you'll have done something else that will wipe it from your mind. That's pretty much guaranteed.

6 comments:

Little Hunting Creek said...

I'm making shirts this weekend too, and you're right, the collars always take the longest! I always make the same shirt and sadly, there are no possible shortcuts -sigh. Yours look so nice and no one will notice a thing because they are much nicer than RTW

Dawn said...

Wow, you're an animal! The shirts look great and no one will ever notice the collar.

Elaray said...

My first thought was, "WHAT, KAREN WENT TO 4TH STREET WITHOUT ME!!!" Then, I remembered my discretionary spending is seriously curtailed until I finish paying for DDs trip. Karen, you are NOT good at helping me say "no" to fabric. LOL Besides, my fabric storage bins are full and I have no place to store more yardage until I sew what I have.

My second thought was, "When it comes to clothes, there is no such thing as too many". I don't know Mario that well, but I bet he wears shirts everyday. He needs at least 183 shirts (so he can wear them twice).

gwensews said...

I applaud you for making shirts for your guy. They look very nice, and I'm sure he is proud to wear them.

Debbie Cook said...

Very nice! It's always so hard to find prints for men's shirts but you found some winners. Looks like Mario sheds his facial hair for summer? LOL!

McVal said...

What great shirts! I'm going to have to try and make my husband one. He loves those Hawaiian type shirts. I wonder if he'll let me try...