Ruffly top for a competition

I finally finished my entry for the Sew & Tell competition over at A Craft a Day. Stupid broken sewing machine, I still can't figure out what's wrong with it. Luckily my MIL has an old Singer that she let me borrow and I was able to finish.

I LOVE how it turned out. Ready for a behind the machine story? I bought this large men's shirt at Target for two bucks back in October. I had this idea and planned on making this shirt for holiday parties. Didn't happened, was too intimidated. Why? Because I've never successfully made a shirt before. I've tried three times, twice with knit, once with pretty cotton. The first two times (with the knit) I horribly screwed up, one time I forgot to add seam allowance and couldn't get the shirt on and the other time I made a huge newbie mistake of cutting the pieces the wrong way, so the shirt didn't stretch around my body. Third time I used a pattern my mom got me and shortly into it got too scared to finish. So this shirt has been sitting in my stash for months, dying to be turned into something fabulous.

Luckily even though I broke my machine halfway through the process, I conquered my fear and made a shirt I can wear!

I love it. I love the sleeves (my own design that I can't even believe worked), I love the sweetheart neckline, I love the flow-y-ness of it. Even though you can't see it, I also made a matching headband with the scraps of the shirt! Thank you AGAAGG for inspiring me to make hair crap.

This is my "Holy crap it's what was I thinking, taking pictures outside? It's freaking freezing!!!" picture. But  it shoes off the neckline and the increased shadows help show off the sublime ruffleness of the sleeves and waist line.

Ahhh. Feels so good to cross a project off my to-do list AND use up some of my stash. Would anyone be interested in a tutorial for this one? I took pictures during the process so I could write one up but I've had too many frustrations with the project I just didn't feel writing up a tutorial. But, if enough people want me to, I will. :)




Don't forget to check out A Craft a Day's Sew & Tell competition!

Edited: On a whim, I also decided to enter this in the American Crafter competition over at Naptime Crafters. Keep your fingers crossed for me for both of these!