When Ellen came to Sydney!

Ellen DeGeneres came to Sydney recently to film an episode of her talk show and to celebrate, a newspaper gave out T-shirts, I was able to get 2 of them, so of course I made them into a T-dress and T-pants. 

I used the front and back of the shirt for the T-pants (reversing them so that the print is now on the back). I then used some black and white striped jersey that I had for the leg cuffs and the waistband.

For the T-dress, I used the sleeves of the black t-shirt as the sleeves. I cut them off and then opened them up at the underarm seam before tracing off my pattern. Although it can't be seen in the photo the original shoulder seams provide a nice detail on the new raglan sleeves.

I used the same black and white jersey for the skirt and hemmed it with Fold-over elastic (20cm) which was also used for the neck and sleeve finishing. Besides providing a nice looking edge and being quick and easy to sew, the weight of the elastic gives the skirt a better fall.

I really like the dress and pants the colours are bold and who doesn't love Ellen!

The T-Dress is a great pattern to use to quickly refashion an adult T-shirt into a cute dress and one day I will do a tutorial, until then if you would like to have a go all you need is a Raglan top pattern and a simple skirt pattern. 

The blog 'Craftiness is not Optional' has a really clear tutorial for a Raglan top and there are plenty of instructions on the internet for a simple skirt, a half circle skirt will work well.

To save time I combined the front and back top patterns into one (see picture), so only the necks are different and I can cut both out at once. I fold the T-shirt in half widthways and then cut out the pattern for the back. The front neck can either be traced out and cut or just cut freehand, just ensure you start and end at the same spots as the pattern.

Okay the next photo hasn't got much to do with Ellen (although I'm sure she is a Belieber as well), I just couldn't resist including it. It does show how you can use different but similar T-shirts to create outfits that go together but are not too matchy-matchy.

If you are interested in seeing other outfits that I have refashioned and made, please visit my blog:

www.orangewho.com.

Cheers

Mary D

Orange Who? At least it's not all Pink and Blue