Little Boy's Vest Tutorial

This is my J. Crew vest inspiration for this project!

And this is my very own finished creation!

Here are the steps I took to make it!

My little boy wears a 2T right now, and I wanted him to be able to wear the vest at Easter, so I took a t-shirt he has that is size 3T to use to draft a pattern:

I traced the torso:

Then, I cut it out and folded it in half and traced around the pattern. I added a point at the bottom.

I added a V-neck about 4" from the top. I only want to cut the front pieces with a v-neck.

I pressed the fabric...which was an old men's Ralph Lauren button down shirt.

I then started cutting!

**One big mistake with my pattern: I did not leave 3/4" overlap on the front pieces. I cut the back the exact same proportion as the front, so it will not overlap. Oops!**

I almost ran out of fabric, so I had to cut one of the lining pieces on the bias. But I really liked

the way it turned out! I should have cut the front pieces this way! Oh well...

Then I had to cut the "v" portion out of the front pieces and the front lining pieces:

I sewed the three outer pieces together at the side seams only. Then I sewed the lining pieces together in the same manner.

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Then, I laid the lining and outside pieces with right sides together, and sewed around the sides, armholes, neck, and the pointy front bottom pieces.

**Other pattern mistake: you'll notice in the above picture that all the pieces are pointy on the bottom. NOT my intention! I fixed this oops by folding the points up and therefore making the back shorter than the front.**

Clip the pointy corners. Cut notches in the curved edges.

Turn the whole thing and iron it all flat. If you made the same mistake regarding pointy pieces on the back, go ahead and iron those up into the rest of the vest.

Pin the bottom part in place. Also, turn under the front part of the shoulder, and then pin it to the back part of the shoulder covering the raw edge with the turned under front part. (You may have to rip out a few stitches for this.)

Try the vest on your model before you go about all the finishing handstitching. Here is my little model during our first fitting. He didn't like the vest.

I did the button holes next. I originally thought maybe I would use the button holes from the shirt which already existed. But since I lined the vest, that was not possible. I made three new ones. Mine are not perfect.

I added three buttons.

Then, I finished up all the hand sewing! Not my favorite part.

And I'm entering the "Knock it Off" Contest at seventhirtythree: