A Winner and A New Top!

Drum roll please…

Sorce candccustomdrums.com via Taylor Armerding via pinterest

              the winner from my fabulous giveaway is…

Sara who wrote:

My husband is my best friend :D

I know how sweet is she?  Well Sara, if you're the Sara I think you are just send me an email (it's under the contact section) and I'll get you your prize.  Thank you to all who entered and shared about your best friends.  Friends are the best and even better when they're your best friend :)  I know cheesy but still it had to be said.  I am so excited for the new followers, thanks, I totally forgot to mention the reason why I offered following as a chance to enter the drawing…I want to be able to do more giveaways!

Now I did mention a top in the title and that is true.  I just finished a new top, the one I've been dreaming of making for about four months but only now finally made it.  The best part?  It is even better than I imagined.  Enough words how about some pictures?!

Okay so here is a little information about the top.  The floral fabric came from a cotton nightgown that had been gift to me for repurposing.  I loved the fabric so much I just knew I had to make something for myself out of it!  At first I was thinking that I would turn it into a summer dress, reusing the top portion but then inspiration struck and I was stuck on the western style yoke and knew that would pair wonderfully with my cotton nightgown.

I just so happened to have a pattern and the blue chambray fabric, which I must confess was a PERFECT match in color to the blue in the flowers.  So here is what I did.  I used Simplicity Pattern 4199 (unfortunately I can't find a link to the pattern) and cut out pieces 5-10 out of the chambray fabric.  The pattern is for a long sleeved shirt but I just cut the pattern of shorter.  Also, since I was only going to need the yoke in blue I cut the front band (piece 7) shorter too.

I loved the embroidery design on the pattern so I cut two yoke backs and 4 yoke fronts.  I traced the embroidery design onto fusible interfacing (the woven side) and then while using the pattern I lined up the design and then ironed on the interfacing to the wrong side of the fabric.  Then using a slightly longer stitch on my machine I stitched the design.  I actually went over the design twice, I thought it looked better, but three times was too much.

The Ladybug is real and Husband didn't notice it at all.
Don't worry, no ladybugs were injured during this photo shoot.

Because I cut double the number of yoke pieces I simply sewed the pieces right sides together to get the nice finished edge of the yoke.  I just treated the double stacked yoke pieces as one and followed the directions for assembly.  I assembled the yoke together first, then the collar and because I'm picky I hand stitched the collar closed.

The front band I did differently than the directions.  The Simplicity pattern had a wider button band than the nightgown did so I made the button band to match the narrow width of the nightgown band.  then I just stitched in on over the yoke fronts.  I didn't add any buttons to the yoke as I knew I would never button up this tunic all the way.

Next I simply cut off the top portion of the nightgown paying attention to the buttons, I wanted to be sure that I wasn't sewing the yoke right on top of a button.

See my super cute helper there in the corner?

Then I traced just few lines onto the nightgown from the front side, front , back and back side pieces for placement of the sleeve.  All that was left was to cut out the fabric.  I did discover that the night gown wasn't even at the ruffle, there was a slight curve upwards at the sides.  So I just cut the ruffle off just above the seam and then resewed it back onto my top which I straightened out.  I also added ties out of the floral fabric to help pull the top in together.

The only other modification I made to the pattern was the sleeves.  In a moment of brilliant insanity I decided to make a small facing on the bottom edge of the sleeve with some left over floral fabric.  Because the sleeve seam was in the back of the arm, very visible, I chose to vent the sea, above the facing.  I like it, now I can wear the sleeves turned up showing off the facing or I can wear them down if I want a longer sleeve.

All in all I am really happy about this.  As soon as I publish this post I'm gonna head over to Rae's photo pool and enter it into the Sewalong contest.  Wish me luck!  

Now a few parting pictures…

Don'tcha love the red shoes?  I do!

{{hugs}} to you all!

If you feel so inclined comment below.  Tell me what you think of my new top or offer a suggestion for the next giveaway.  Also, if you find a link to anything I missed just mention it in the comments below and I'll quick as a wink get it added.  Thanks again!