This is another top I whipped up when I realized I had nothing to wear for Me Made May. When deciding what length to make this iteration of my trusty McCalls 7195, I forgot two things: the original uses a ribbing band on the bottom, adding two inches; and that view C is basically a crop top and I should never, ever use it. Well. I almost had a horsey belly shirt.

This top took about twice as long to make as it should have to fix this mistake. I had already created a neck facing and shortened the sleeves to t-shirt length, but it took some MacGyver-ing to make this top wearable. I had already planned on making my next version a slouchy, casual peplum, so the solution to my way-too-short problem was pretty apparent.

Unfortunately, I used most of my fabric and didn’t have any more fold left, so I had to piece together a regtangle long enough to need any amount of gathering to to bunch, so I pieced together four panels to go all the way around. I knew that I didn’t want a seam running straight down the middle or back, so I offset the side seams, meaning that I have what sort of looks like princess seams in the front and back and no side seam. It’s not ideal, but it works.

The second challenge I ran into was getting that peplum at the right height. I thought for the longest time that I couldn’t wear peplum because it just looked terrible on me. It turns out that ready to wear peplums tend to hit me at the wrong spot and I could make my own, perfect peplum. I gathered my peplum band, sewed it on and then realized it was still way too low. Idiot as I am, I had already unpicked my basting for the gathering (yes, painfully unpicked as it didn’t slide out as it was supposed to) and couldn’t bear the though of having to do that all again, so I tucket it up and basically sewed it up like a same hem. It was super quick and looked great. I felt pretty genious.

The second reason my peplum was looking pretty terrible is that I had a lot of bulk going on at that seam and it make everything look bulky and heavy. I easily fixed that by serging all of that seam allowance into one, steaming well, and then top stitching it down. It now lays perfectly and looks fabulous.

I got about a thousand compliments when I first wore it to work. Being that my place employment is an elementary school, and the top features horses and puppies, that is not all that shocking. It’s super breezy for summer, but I won’t lie, it feels a little weird for my belly to have quite so much air. I feel constantly afraid that a strong gust of wind will pick it up and expose my stomach to a field full of children. I think I’ll start wearing a camisole underneath, just to be safe.