MAILBOX SURPRISE . GIRL LIKE THE SEA

Ultimo dia do Mailbox Surprise! Tal como anunciei ontem,, hoje tenho por aqui a Tara do blog Girl Like the Sea. Incrivel como ela consegue transformar o tecido mais clássico do mundo numa camisa cheia de pinta para o seu filho mais novo...

 

Mailbox Surprise last day, today... As I told you yesterday, Tara from Girl Like the Sea is here with a this cool baby shirt. I am so amazed with the way Tara was able to turn the world's most classic fabric into a super edgy shirt!

 

Hello, and happy Friday! This is Tara from Girl Like The Sea today to share the last Mailbox Surprise results

 

The final result of my mailbox surprise is here! You can see my previous post on the arrival of the package here

My goodies arrived in Virginia via New Zealand from Constanca. She blogs at Saidos Da Concha (and just found out she's having a baby boy!).
Speaking of baby boys, that's who I happened to sew for with the beautiful check fabric Constanca sent me. I love the color she picked and the scale of the check. Not big, not tiny. Just right for this project. Even though the fabric arrived ages ago, and I've been holding onto this Oliver and S sketchbook shirt pattern for a while, I waited impatiently for the time to sew it all up into the vision in my mind. My son, Hawthorne, is almost 8 months old, and I didn't really have the energy or motivation to sew for him until he was mobile. Well, it so happens that he's taken off in the past month and is crawling after his sisters and their activities with a lot of enthusiasm. Just in time to show off his handsome new shirt! I thought it would be fun to go with a vintage feel for my project, inspired by the vintage supplies in my mailbox surprise package. Honestly......I'm in love with this little shirt. The fabric is perfect and the pattern is perfect, and Hawthorne looks like a tiny delicious little man in it.
Constanca sent me a light to mid weight woven check that is just perfect for shirting. Light and crisp. Perfect for spring and summer. I sewed the sketchbook shirt up in a 6-12 month size and it's pretty roomy on him with room to grow. Included in the package was a cute little vintage embroidery instruction booklet, so I added some embroidery to my little tag. It's terrible embroidery to be sure, but still inspired by my package. Haha. But it's the best I can do when I'm hastily stitching by hand while nursing a baby. One detail I love about this sewing pattern is the curved hem.

I added a contrast yoke with some menagerie fabric by art gallery. I thought it looked cute and boyish with the checks. Snaps seemed the way to go with a baby shirt, but I only had these vintage sew in snaps on hand (which goes great with the vintage vibe of everything in the mailbox surprise package!). I didn't like the look of my fugly stitching on the outside of the shirt though, so I hand sewed these buttons on top of them. It would have made sense to use the amazing vintage buttons that came in my package, but they were just slightly too big for this tiny shirt and the proportions looked off. These vintage buttons on the shirt came from an antique store.
I'm currently hoarding the buttons, rick rack, and ribbon Constanca sent me.

There's another surprise on the back of the shirt. My first attempt at piping! I made it myself with some olive/chartreuse colored shot cotton I scored for free, and some cording I had on hand. It adds a touch of vintage flare, I think. And a fun pop of boy-friendly color on the back. I was kind of inspired to try piping by my mailbox surprise partner, An at Straightgrain who is great at adding the perfect piping to a project. It's always seemed a scary thing to try to me, but I just decided to go for it this time and I'm glad I did!

My poor little man wasn't feeling the whole photo shoot thing this time. He's sniffly and teething and was tired. He just wanted to chew on a big red cup, which was making his face rashy, and he cried when I took it away. So.....not many great pictures of him in his handsome new shirt. Oh well. He does look dapper in it. Especially paired with the Lego bow tie I made for him. I'm so glad I was included in this series. What a fun opportunity to shrink the world a bit by bringing people together from all parts of it. I now have an adorable heirloom quality shirt for my boy, made with special fabric that was picked out and sent to me all the way from New Zealand. Hobbit land!

I mention heirloom quality btw, because this Oliver and S pattern is so professional and good. You get every detail right, just like an expensive ready to wear item. Thank you for including me in this fun series!