100 Acts of Sewing, Shirt No. 1

I've been eyeing Sonya Philip's 100 Acts of Sewing, Shirt No. 1 pattern for quite some time now. The simplicity of Sonya's patterns makes trying something new so very easy and approachable. I made a quick basic top in no time flat (cut and stitched in less than two hours). I hand stitched the two seams (yes, only two seams!!), because stitching by hand was quicker than getting out my sewing machine and setting it up. Plus, I prefer sewing in the evenings without the extra noise of the machine.

I used a lovely lightweight cotton/linen jersey. The drape is beautiful, and it feels whisper soft on the skin. I decided not to bind anything to keep the edges light.

My second go of this shirt was made with a white organic cotton jersey base layer from Organic Cotton Plus, and some gorgeous naturally hand-dyed madder, organic cotton from Alabama Chanin that I have been saving for something special. I wanted to try using the negative reverse applique technique with this top to keep it lighter, but I didn't have quite enough of the madder fabric to make one complete layer of the shirt. I did have just enough fabric for straight up applique though.

I cut out the white fabric, the base layer, and painted it using my poppy stencil. I used Tulip brand colorshot fabric spray in camel. This project was a bit of a stash buster, trying to use up what I already had, so when I stenciled my remnants of madder fabric, I used up my camel paint and finished up with silver glitter paint.

Now, when I was stenciling this project there were five of us ladies painting together and chatting up a storm. I forgot to flip the stencil over (uh-oh), which would have created the mirror image of the poppy stencil and allowed me to use the flip side or non-painted sides of the elements, and thus the two different colored paints wouldn't show. At first I was disappointed that I made the mistake. I didn't have enough madder fabric to redo the painting, so I had to work with what I had. I actually really like the results. I like the two different colors of paint, and further mixed things up by flipping some of the elements to the non-painted side. Phew, lucky I didn't grab that leftover lime green color I had, but instead inadvertently used two complimentary shades!

In the above photo, the element on the left is painted with the silver paint; the element on the bottom right is painted with the camel paint; and small element on the top right is unpainted. I also appliqued white centers on some of the flowers. I used embroidery floss to whipstitch the elements down and embellish with French knots and random stitches. Button craft thread was used for construction.

I downsized the shirt no. 1 pattern to an XS, and it's still pretty roomy for my normally small to medium sized top. The first single layered, lightweight shirt is much more drapey. The embellished shirt, with it's medium weight base and added applique feels more like a comfy sweatshirt. The sleeves hit about 1" above my inner elbow and 2-3" above my elbow. I dipped the neckline of the second shirt slightly, about 1-2". I did not bind either shirt.

Here are a couple ways I might wear this fun top. I think my favorite will be to pull it over a white tank top and pair it with my jean cut offs with white sandals. What are you making for this hot summer weather?