Playing Catch up

Well I've been doing a lot of sewing lately but not a lot of blogging.  I never seem to get a chance to take photos of my new makes so I put off writing them up and then end up as I am, at least, 7 makes behind.

Oh well let us go back to last year....yep we have to go that far to catch up with all my new winter shirts for the season.

  

This is a self drafted pattern.  I was getting bored of shirts that are just basic basic and wanted to try something slightly different, so I decided on a fake wrap top.  Now I will start by saying that I've always had a bit of a problem with wrap tops and dresses in that my boobs are too big and the wraps never seem to sit properly.   I find that either the wraps cross right across the top of the breasts as is happening here, or if I make them cross below my boobs, then the cleavage is almost indecent.  For this first iteration, I wanted a higher cross as this is a winter top and the last thing I want in winter is a lot of exposed skin.  I'm not happy with the way it sits but it's certainly wearable.

The pattern for this top consists of a basic sleeve, and back piece, and then  two front pieces starting from the shoulder and crossing to the opposite side seam.

  

 Due to an issue with the amount of fabric I had I had to modify the pattern slightly so the front piece that crosses underneath actually stops just below my breast rather than extending all the way down.

The neck band is a simple doubled up length that extends from one side seam, up and around the neck and back down to the other side seam.

The material for this shirt is the grey knit that I bought when I was making my grey and white striped shirt I blogged about here, but only used a small amount of it in the bottom band and collar. It is actually a two layer material, the grey is backed with a white knit. Unfortunately I didn't buy a lot of it, and as I said earlier there wasn't quite enough material so I had to get creative.  The sleeves I could only make 3/4 length and i had to cut off the front under piece below my breasts.  I did not want to leave the sleeves 3/4 length as I hate 3/4 length sleeves, especially in a winter shirt when I want warmth so I went through my stash for a fabric that would go with this.  I found this piece of knit that my son chose for a shirt a couple of years ago and cut an extra long cuff out of it.  To balance it out I also added a band of this fabric around the bottom.  I considered doing the neck band in the contrast colour, but decided against it as I don't like the look of an unsymmetrial contrast band.

overall its not perfect, but I'm certainly happy to wear it, and I have plenty of ideas on how to modify this pattern for another top.