Terrific T-Shirts

We are back from a great vacation week in Rehoboth Beach, DE. We rent the biggest house we can afford a couple blocks from the beach and invite family and friends. My parents, 2 of 3 siblings, many cousins, and my best friend from college, live in MD, VA and DE, within a reasonable driving distance. It is a constant stream of people and food. The girls who sew always make a point of visiting Mare’s Bears, a quilting shop in Lewes, DE. We also shop the discount book stores for quilting, and craft books. We have been doing this for about 30 years and we have started to reminisce about some of the wilder “pre kids” times. It is now our kids that are providing the excitement. 13 year old girl and 15 years old boy cousins, testing the limits of their parent’s rules on boardwalk curfews and attire. The girls fell victim to a box of cute kittens “Free to a good home” and hid two of them in a bedroom of our ‘no pets rental” for several days before being discover by an adult. Fortunately two of their friends were able to take them. The week before vacation I finally got around to making a T-shirt for my younger sister Suzanne, from fabric she bought at G-Street fabrics. She is predominately a quilter, having had traumatic clothes sewing experiences in high school. We still chuckle about the time she sewed sleeves into a blouse upside down, matching the underarm of the sleeves to the shoulder seam. The blouse fit great when she held her arms up in a cheerleader “rah rah” pose. Any other arm position resulted in tight shoulders and massive bunching under the arm. I too have my share of of similar sewing incidents.

For her T-shirt I chose to go with Simplicity 4076, which has 50 plus good reviews on http://www.patternreview.com. I had sent her instructions on taking her bust, waist and back measurements. I included my measurements, thinking if she saw mine she would not be surprised or dismayed at her own. Though we have similar coloring and hair, she is smaller and has cuter features than I do. I was sure her measurements would be very different than mine. Image our surprise when they were exactly the same, except she is longer waisted. As she said, she is the same top on shorter legs.
It did make fitting a snap though. The reviews of that pattern are right on the money. The gathered front T shirt was easy to make, and it fit great. That made me want to try the other styles, so I raided my stash and whipped up the crossover top and knotted front versions as well. All winners! Here she is modeling all three tops in front of the beach house. They all went great with her white pants.

I liked them so much, I orders some great print knits from http://fashionistafabrics.com that coordinated with my summer SWAP (Yes, Melody, that was me. Love the fabrics!) My sister liked the shirts so much she asked if I thought she could make one on her regular sewing machine. I told her yes, and brought two smallish suitcases of knits from my stash to the beach for her to choose from. My husband rolled his eyes whan he found out the suitcases contained fabric. All the girls happily helped her choose a couple of pieces. It is so great to have sewing friends and relatives!