day two of baby free sewing time

I was in my sewing room at 8am this morning, shortly after Anna left for childcare (I let my husband do the drop off that so he gets the look of abandonment, not me!) Things were whirring along nicely until I tried to be fancy and use my overlocker for a rolled hem for the first time in the 6+ years I've owned it. For months now I've needed to get it serviced because the tension is all over the place and the right needle thread keeps breaking, but because I couldn't bear to be without it I reverted to three thread overlocking which worked ok. Until now. I guess it's time to finally take it to a repair place, and use the time without it for cutting out future projects, or sewing up things that don't need overlocking, like those pesky curtains for our living room that are still waiting to be finished. Or even just cleaning up my sewing room, now there's a novel though.

Anyway here's the blouse I finished up last night. It only took three hours of baby free time during the day to sew up from cutting out to 99% finished, and I finished sewing the buttons on last night after the little rascal went to bed. I call this my sedate librarian look:

Hmmm, looks like I need to stop standing with my hands on my hips, because the narrow shoulder and set in sleeves of this top get those awful wrinkles when I do that. Maybe I'm going to improve my demeanour through my wardrobe!

I used Simplicity 4676, a vintage pattern picked up in an op shop which I nearly didn't buy because the envelope is pretty beaten up and I wasn't sure if all the pieces would be in it. But I can't resist a vintage pattern no matter what, so I'm pretty glad I did buy it because I really like this blouse. I'd guess this is an early 1960s pattern, going by the pre-decimal currency price on the envelope.

It was so easy to make, and the fit is superb for a vintage pattern, normally I find them to have loads of ease and they are often too loose and baggy. It fits pretty well at the back too even though I didn't make any allowance for my swayback because I knew I'd be tucking this shirt in for work wear:

I'm not too sure I like the bow look, maybe I need to practise tying better bows:

But I do like it worn with the ties loose and knotted at the neck line instead. I just need to get my husband to show me how to do fancy tie knots like a windsor or half windsor or whatever they are called:

I've made it from a cotton shirting in a fine dark red pinstripe on a crisp white bought from Spotlight for the insane price of $2m. I managed to find some dark red buttons in the stash that go nicely with the fabric, don't you love it when that happens?

Next planned is a fairly simple top in a chiffon, so maybe I'll do french seams so I can get on with sewing even without my overlocker. No sense wasting another baby free day tomorrow is there?

Happily I can say that whilst Anna did have some tears again today, she ate all her meals, had two sleeps (a miracle in itself really) and wasn't as bad as yesterday apparently. And me? No guilt whatsoever today!