Emmie Loves.....: ...Spunky Vest and Bow Tie Boys T-Shirt

So, was it just in my circle of friends, or was last year 'Year of the Baby' for everyone?

Seriously! I could count about 20 people I knew last year having babies. Crazy!

So-year of the baby last year =Year of the One-Year-Olds this year, which means lots and lots of little prezzies for bubbas!

You may have noticed so far that I'm a bit of a girly girl (No, really?!) and having a little girl myself, it makes it very easy to get carried away with pretty colours and florals and the like continually-and I am aware of this!

So when a little boy's birthday pops up, I am suddenly quite lost! Does he like pastels? How about a lovely floral dress for the little man.

Nope

I need to man up and find something masculine.

Here's where Friday's task comes in.

Now, all of the online patterns for this outfit are usually made with a onesie-but Jackson is 1 and I don't really know how much wear a 1yo would get out of one, so I opted for the t-shirt option.

In the future, I would probably try to get a smaller top as you kinda want the vest part to be a bit nore snug, so maybe opt for a size below your little one, but as Jackson's Mummy said.."Maybe he can wear it for his second birthday!" Ooops!

I found my pattern here, and I made up the bow tie one myself. It was a lot of fun.

Here's the steps!!

Lay a piece of A4 printer paper over your t-shirt and draw where you would like the vest to sit. Make sure that your top line lines up with the seam of the shirt, and the arm hole sits about a centimetre from the arm seam.

Cut out your pattern piece once you are happy with it, and it not scribble over it and make any changes you need.

Here is a lovely messy picture for you to use as a guide!

When cutting out your fabric, you need to ensure that you allow for a seam allowance. Please don't forget to do this!!

Cut 2 pieces of each fabric, and make sure you flip the pattern piece so you have a mirror image of the front and the back piece

For the brown fabric, I used a pair of Heath's old pants (a fancy expensive brand name that he was chucking out and I refused to waste!) and for the lining I used some pale blue cotton fabric (see, I got the pastels in there somehow!)

Place the different fabrics together, right sides facing, and sew all the way around, leaving a space at the top for turning out.

Turn out your pieces, press the seams, then top stitch around the entire edge to make it nice and tidy.

Attach your vest pieces to the t-shirt being really careful to not sew through both layers of the tee (yep, I speak from experience!).

Lots and lots of pinning comes in handy as the stretchiness of the t-shirt fabric can make it really tricky to keep steady and aligned correctly! Slow and steady wins the race here.