I Made a Dress Out Of a Man's Shirt

There's a group of crafty individuals out there that are using old thrift store clothes and turning them into useful, cute clothes.  I wanted in, but I can't sew.  That is until now.  All summer long I've been learning how to sew; on my own with no teacher.  There are a lot of tutorials on the internet for this.  Obviously I'm still a beginner, so I've had a major learning curve to overcome.  Here's a couple of the dresses I've made so far.

This dress intrigued me with its pattern.  No they are not strawberries.  The pattern of the fabric just put me in a good mood.  This was a very large dress and I am a very small person, so I had plenty of fabric to use.  Oh and it cost only $2.50!

This is the dress I ended up making.  I used a pattern from Patterns.com.  This pattern was only 99 cents to download but it was written in Russian!  Did I mention that learning curve?  I had no instructions to work with but I stuck with it.  I'm a trooper I tell ya.  

I'm pretty happy with the results.  Not too shabby for an absolute beginner.  

How about this little gem here ladies and gentlemen?

This next dress started out as a man's shirt from The Gap.  I liked the light green pattern and the material was cotton.  You can't go wrong with cotton when making a summer dress.  This shirt cost a whole $2.50.  

This is the final summer dress I came up with.  I kept the button details and the shirt tails.  By the way, I used a free online Burda pattern.  Check out Burdastyle.com.  They have tons of free downloadable patterns for all levels of sewing competence.  

I love the back of this little dress!  Seriously check out Burda Style.  They have really up to date fashion patterns.  

I also made this skirt out of a HUGE one I found at Goodwill.  Cute no?  The skirt was FUGLY!  Sorry I forgot to take a before pic.  Basically I took the original skirt apart and added a contrasting band from a pair of slacks my husband thought he threw out.  Honest I'm not a hoarder.  

My mother asked me why I wanted to sew when store bought clothes are so cheap.  I told her the satisfaction of "I made this" can't be bought.  Am I right?  

Nydia 8)