$2 and 2 Hours (so far)

I have been hunting interesting t-shirts at thrift stores with plans to make unique boy's clothing.  I actually made some infant gowns out of adult t-shirts before the big gender reveal.  I have also used the scraps from those t-shirts to applique baby outfits.  This project bounces back to using the whole t-shirt, and WHAT a t-shirt I found!!!!

If you saw our Christmas Card, then you got a glimpse of our Chevy Impala station wagon, or "daddy wagon" as we refer to it.  When I found this shirt at my local AmVet's where all the children's clothing is 89 cents a piece, I got SO excited.   I LOVED the vintage feel of the color and the logo.  AND it is super soft, which can be less likely in the thrifted shirt category, but is SO necessary for baby stuff.  This shirt, was a smaller adult or teen, so priced at a very reasonably $2, instead of my usual 89 cents, but who cares!  

I loved this one so much that I didn't want to make a night gown that no one would see.  I also wanted to avoid anything newborn size because I wanted it to be worn for a while.  I had looked at some tutorials on line for making shortalls from old t-shirts.  This link includes an actual pattern that you can download.  I am not really a follow a pattern kind of gal AND I kind of wanted pants instead of shorts, so I created a pattern using an existing baby romper.  First, I laid the one piece outfit on top of the t-shirt and checked for placement of the Chevy logo.  

Next, I started cutting out the basic shape.  I was leaving a little extra room for the seam allowance (the extra fabric that will go into the seam) and noticed that the bottom hem of the shirt was only a little longer than the legs on the outfit.  I didn't want my pants gathered at the bottom, so I just decided to roughly use this distance as the amount of room to leave for the seam allowance everywhere.  The original outfit was a 3-6 month size, so I hope the upcycled outfit will be more like 6-9 months in size and length. At the top, I carefully cut free the neckband and used that as the edge of the new neck.  I did NOT cut above the shoulders, I just left the original shirt in tack all the way up to the shoulder seam, because this design has those shoulders that overlap to allow a head to go through without needing to button in the back.

Here is a close up of the neckline.  On the right is the shoulder as originally cut at just the t-shirt shoulder seam.  On the left is where I have trimmed the shoulder to match the overlap on the baby outfit.  Once you have one of these figured out, it is the same shape for the other side and also for the front and back.  It is also the same neckline shape that I have been using for the baby gowns from upcycled t-shirts

Moving down to the crotch, notice that the front and the back are different here, to accommodate for a bulky diaper butt. I only wanted the front shape for now, so I tucked under the back side to get the right shape.  Just make sure you are cutting the front and back separately if you try something similar.

I also folded my t-shirt fabric in half, so that I could cut once and have both of the front halves be symmetrical.

At this point the main front piece, with the logo was finished.  I used it as a pattern for the back piece up until I cut the crotch.  I had to use the back of the baby outfit to get that shape correct. (sorry no pictures) Also, the crotch had one extra piece to also help with the extra room needed for a bulky diaper.  Don't miss that detail if you are doing something similar.

For the trim at the neckline, I discovered that the off white of the Mickey Mouse shirt that I turned into a night gown was a good contrast.  (I also used some scraps from the MM shirt in the peace sign applique the other day!) I cut it in half at the fold to accommodate the front and the back piece.  This took the place of the sock that I used on the blue night gown and i liked the way it sewed much better.

Here the trim has been sewn to the right side of the front and it just needs to be turned to the inside and edge stitched.

Because the Chevy shirt was smaller in size, the sleeves wouldn't have been long enough.  So I uses the extra from that Mickey Mouse shirt (it was really HUGE) to make a full length sleeve and then overlapped it with a shorter dark grey sleeve.

This picture shows everything during the assembly process, so it is inside out.  I lined up and overlapped the shoulders first.  Then I sewed the sleeves to the shoulder.  Finally  i sewed all the way from the end of the sleeve, into the arm pit, and then down the side seam to the bottom of the pants.  It is SO similar to what I did on the gowns.  The only difference is that I have to deal with that crotch and that requires SNAPS, which I am hoping to buy tonight and spend my hour completing this outfit.  However, Lydia is home sick AGAIN (I am VERY thankful for my sister taking a turn with her so that I didn't need a 5th day off from work in a row!) and I have one work commitment this evening.  So I am cheating a little with 3rd post for Elsie Marley's Kid's Clothing Week Challenge.  I am posting this (almost finished) view of the Chevy romper with my promise to spend an hour shopping for, buying and figuring out how to install those crazy diaper changing snaps in baby clothing.  Honestly, it won't look any different with the snaps, so enjoy a glimpse of the (mostly) finished outfit!