Refashion Peplum Blouse

Today is week 2 of Refashion month and I am loving it! I'm not the best seamstress in the world, but sewing is just another form of art so if you understand how things should look, you can do this simple tutorial!
I found this nasty top at the local thrift shop. It was a beautiful material and I liked the print, but it had these awful shoulder pads and looked like it had been made for someone's grandma. I hope she now knows that her blouse is being put to good use!
(more after the jump...)


For this project, all you need is a boxy shirt of some kind.
Like all my projects, I started by ripping out the seems that held the sleeves and those horrible shoulder pads out.
I wanted to add a slight peplum to the blouse so I cut the shirt in half.

I slipped the top part of the shirt on and eyeballed the length that I needed to take off of each side to make it more fitted. It needed to be taken in about 2" so I measured and pinned it together before sewing a super easy line down each side.
The bottom of the shirt became the skirted part with a super easy basting seam. This means the thread was really loose so that I could bunch the fabric into ruffles. Then I set the skirt aside to finish the sleeves.
I promised a clearer tutorial on how to reattach sleeves later, but I hope these instructions make sense. The arm hole of the bodice was all ready because I had sewed a line down each side to make it more fitted. The same method needed to be done to the sleeves by slipping them on and measuring how much to take off of the bottom. 
*Note: Always allow for a little extra space for your arms to move! Pinning the sleeves onto the bodice is the most important part.
I start from the top of the sleeve and work my way to the bottom on both sides to make sure they stay even. If you pin correctly the sewing part is easy and then you just have to turn them inside out!
The last step is to resew the skirt on! I used a super slight method to make the back a bit lower than the front. The only difference to follow this style is to pin the skirt on in an S shape from the front to the back, as shown in the photo above. Once your skirt is pinned on, just sew it, steam it and call it good!
Remember - there are a bunch more refashions coming your way this month! Don't forget to LIKE my FB or follow my Twitter to keep up with all tutorials!
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