ruffling up some boys t-shirts

May 7, 2009 | 6 Comments

When I go to Neat Repeatz, I check the girls clothing first, then head over to the boys clothing. Why? Most of the time the boys stuff is a lot cooler. A girl can only have so many pink shirts with flowers and hearts. What about dinosaurs? Cars? Trains? I never see those in the girls section. It’s always Dora, Dora, Dora. My daughter doesn’t even watch Dora. She likes Thomas the Tank Engine, Lightening McQueen and Mickey Mouse.

On my last trip, I found two shirts I knew Bella would love. They were 3T, but a little too short for my tall toddler. I was afraid they wouldn’t last until the end of the season. Inspired by Rachel’s tutorial for lengthening pants, I added a few inches to the shirts with some ruffle trim.

ruffle shirt

Both were iTalk shirts, so I removed the big patch on the front and tossed the little computer chip thingie, which didn’t work in either shirt. Then I washed them so the holes from the patch stitches would close up a bit.

ruffle shirt

I used about a yard of ruffle trim for each shirt. After a few attempts to pin the ruffle to the hem, I just put it in the machine and aligned it as I went.

ruffle trim

I’m really happy with how these turned out. Both shirts took less than an hour to sew up. Bella was a little worried when she saw them in the machine. “What are you doing with my Lightening McQueen shirt, mom?” When I showed her the finished shirt, she loved it.

refashion: Adding trim is a great way to freshen up an old t-shirt, especially one that’s too short.

Category: all posts, refashion, sewing, tutorials
Tags: lengthen > ruffle > t-shirt > trim

Comments

6 Responses to “ruffling up some boys t-shirts”

kelly
May 7th, 2009 @ 9:06 pm

Cute! What a great idea! Especially for girls who have older brothers….
Blakely
May 8th, 2009 @ 10:01 am

I know a lady who would smock trains in pink and pastels for her girls because she couldn’t find anything like that for them.
Krista
May 8th, 2009 @ 11:09 am

I hear you about “gender specific” clothing, except mine goes the other way. Why are all the boy clothes modeled to make the babies look like little adult men, while the girls have clothing that is freshly young? That irritates me.
Limor
May 8th, 2009 @ 11:37 am

My daughter also loves Lightning McQueen. What a cute idea.
Natalie
May 9th, 2009 @ 8:41 am

This is such a great idea. Interestingly, I have a boy and am always envy of those who have girls on how cute their dresses look like with all those flowers and pink. Now I shouldn’t envy anymore as boys’ can be fun and girls want their stuff too
One Crafty Place » Prolonging the Life of Girl’s Tees
May 11th, 2009 @ 6:02 am

[...] handed on down or donated, but for those extra special tees, I think this wardrobe refashion from Julie Kundhi may be perfect keeping them around a little longer. Go to her blog to read about how she added a [...]