Wardrobe refashion: tank tops

On Saturday I decided that it was time to repaint our living room/kitchen (the 30% off coupon for Sherwin-Williams in the paper that week might have had something to do with that) so I bought paint and supplies and informed my (long-suffering) husband that on Monday, we'd be painting. In an unusual twist for me, I didn't agonize over paint choices--I took the advice of the nester and many others is blogland, and went with Rice Grain. It was a snap decision and I hadn't even seen the paint chip until I walked in the store, but it seems to look okay and at any rate, it's too late to change our minds now, right?

We painted all day yesterday so the house is just torn apart. Today I hope to get everything put back together because the mess is making me twitch. I still have the Halloween boxes to put away, too so literally the entire first floor of my house is a disaster and there's not a clear vertical surface in the place.

A few weekends ago when there was enough clear space on my table for my sewing machine, I made a few fun things to add to my fall/winter wardrobe. Old Navy had these tanks on sale for $7 so I picked up three to see if I could do something with them.

For the first, I tried making ruffles with ribbon, a technique I've wanted to try for a while. I used wide red-and-cream striped ribbon from Stampin' Up! and sewed a long stitch down the middle with my sewing machine. Then I pulled the strings to create the ruffles, and pinned the ruffles around the neckline of the tank.

It was tricky to figure out what to do with the ends of the ribbon. I ended up cutting them into dove tails, which reminds me that I need to pick up some Fray Check at the craft store. After I pinned the ruffles, I sewed down their middles.

And now all I can think of is bacon. Is it just me? I made kind of a mess of sewing the ends, so to help hide that I clipped on a flower pin I'd just made that fortuitously is in just the right color of red.

I like it, even though it's not perfect. I'd like to try it again but use different ribbon or even buy another tank to cut up and make ruffles out of the knit.

The next tank was much easier. For inspiration, I used this refashioned skirt that I bought earlier this summer:

To make my design, I cut a simple leaf shape out of a cardboard scrap and used it as a template to cut more leaves out of scrap fabric.

I chose pale green vintage skinny rickrack from my stash, and pinned it down the side of the shirt with the leaves spaced out.

I used red thread to sew them all down, because one of the things I loved about the original design on the skirt was the use of bright, contrasting colors. I sewed the rickrack first, slowly and carefully. If I did this again, I'd wait to cut the rickrack until it was all sewn down. I thought I had measured enough but once it was sewn down, the rickrack came up a bit short at the top of the shirt. I think the knit stretched or something and it's annoying and I can't fix it so I'll just have to live with it and remember next time to sew from the top down!

When it came to the leaves, I tried the one on the bottom first (since if I messed up a little, it would be less visible) and completely screwed it up. Sigh. So I cut another leaf using my handy template, and this time I used a bit of fabric glue just in the center of the leaves to tack them down to the shirt so they wouldn't move when was trying to sew around them.

That worked much better! I thought about using an iron-on fusible product underneath but if you do that, you don't get the cute fringing on the outside of the leaves after they've been washed.

I'm happier with this shirt and it was so darn easy! I think both tanks will be fun to wear over long-sleeved tees this fall and winter. I still have one navy tank left to refashion but I'm waiting for inspiration to strike.