• she/her

My hobbies are all excuses to collect pretty colors. I enjoy knitting, sewing, running, trombone-ing, gardening, & sci-fi short stories. Coding when necessitated and occasionally for fun. Microbiology for fun & (non-)profit.


I promise I ironed this shirt before I took photos, but it's made of linen, and this is about as good as it gets!

One of my fronts is slightly off-grain, but it's only really noticeable on the button band. I made sure that was the one on the inside.

Since I sewed it for the Sleeves pop-up sew-along at PatternReivew, I did the cuffs as-written in the pattern. I like the interest the cuffs add to the solid linen fabric, but I might stick with hemming in the future because it's a lot quicker and I tend towards chambray/patterned fabric where such details get lost.

For next time I want to start from a fresh print-off of the pattern. This is make #5 of this pattern, and I've tweaked it so much that the pattern paper's hard to work with. Plus I think I've got the back length incorrect in relation to the front somehow now! Since I've mostly got my alterations dialed in1, it's time for a fresh copy with them all on it now.

My bobbin tension spring had trouble again about mid-way through sewing this, about a year after I replaced the bobbin case for the spring being sprung. I think my Singer HD4432 might just be really tough on bobbin springs!

Full review is at Pattern Review.


  1. 1/4" narrow shoulder, drop the armscye 1/4", take out 1" length at waistline, take in waist 4", take in hips 1", adjust side seam from armscye to waist to hip to follow actual curves.

You must log in to comment.

in reply to @effika's post:

Thank you! Sometimes it's good to look at a project from a distance, instead of in the weeds. If I can get it better than ready-to-wear, I'm trying to let myself move on from quibbles while sewing.

i think that's a very healthy attitude, and also, it seems like you might be quite petite?? so being able to make nice clothes exactly for yourself is such a great skill! (i'm VERY tall, same problems opposite side)