Since she didn’t think she’d make any of the projects in the (awesome) book I got my mom for her birthday, she asked me to make her a shirt instead.  I bought her this pattern last summer and have been dying to make it for both of us.

I started by taking measurements.  My mom and I are both of the ignorance is bliss school when it comes to stepping on a scale or taking our own measurements, and then we wonder why the garments we make (cut from an assumed size) have such fitting problems.  I wasn’t going to let our fear of the measuring tape stop us so I took my mom’s measurements and wrote them (out of her view) in the various size categories on the back of this envelope.  I traced off a pattern using the various sizes we needed for each area and then tried on the swedish tracing paper muslin on (with tape.  I know you can sew that stuff, but I needed quick and dirty in the kitchen so Ella didn’t get upset with us for not including her this time.) 

She had initially chosen a brown linen with Anna Maria Horner’s Chocolate Lollipop “Perky plaid” as accent colors which, honestly, would look fabulous on her reddish hair, blue-eyed yet warm complexion.  So I went downstairs to find it before she came to visit and could not resist grabbing the denim-blue Tencel that was waiting on the bottom shelf.  Almost the same color as my mom’s eyes, and a perfect match for the Kaffe Fassett “Paperweights” fabric I just picked up in “pastel.”

I should mention that she requested I don’t “take all that time making the inside finishes perfect.”

Yeah, right.  As if I’m not going to make this the most perfect garment I’ve ever sewn.  It’s a birthday gift, for goodness’ sake!  For My Mother.

I am very excited to make this shirt for her.  Now I should carve some time out to get going!