Oh look! It's me! Wearing a button-up (or is it button-down?) shirt! With jeans and rain boots! Imagine that.
Truth is that I wear some variation of this outfit almost every day of the rainy Portland fall/winter/spring. In fact, I've worn this shirt probably two or three times a week since I finished it a few weeks ago, and I am constantly reaching for it.
Plus, I don't think you are allowed to live in Oregon without a shirt like this. At least, that's what Pinterest tells me. (And I always listen to Pinterest.)
What you're looking at is a Grainline Archer Button-Up in a lovely buffalo plaid stretch shirting that I purchased locally at Mill End. As of now, they still have some, but it's only at their east-side location in Milwaukie. They have it in a royal blue version at the west-side store.
I made my usual Grainline size 4, and it's great (measurements approx. 34-27-36 and 5'6" tall). In the photo below, I see a little pulling across the shoulders that I didn't realize I had until just now. I have about five of these in a size 4 and one in a size 6, so perhaps I will compare them next time I'm hanging out in my closet to see if I should start sizing up for the dozen that are probably in my future.
(Truth is that I already have two more in various stages of completion in my sewing room - and they are both 4s, so I hope it's all good.)
I made no modifications to the pattern other than forgetting to topstitch around the sleeve caps. I think I forget some little detail on almost every garment I sew. Oh well. Such is life.
Side note: Kelly told me about these boots when I moved to Portland, and they are FAB. If you have narrow calves like I do, and you don't like your rain boots flopping all around, these are a must-have. I replaced the insole with a tennis shoe insole and call these my "winter Birkenstocks."
Oh and see that pic above? PLAID MATCHING for the win! Seriously, I used to dread stripe matching, but I've come to love it. I was at dinner with Amy Alan one night, and she commented that "stripe matching is the fun part." Since then, I've had her words on repeat in my head. I definitely don't start on a striped/plaid project if I'm not in the mood (and my kids are soundly asleep), but I have come to enjoy it much more since changing how I think about it. I find that having plaids match vertically and horizontally (including the button band) gives my preferred look. So there you have it.
A quick google search will yield plenty of tutorials on how to match plaids, so I'm certainly not going to write one (not that I would do so, anyway because I HATE WRITING TUTORIALS). But the quick and dirty version of my method involves cutting the button band first with a little extra length that can be trimmed later, and working my way out from there.
OH and isn't this tee the best? I posted it on Facebook hoping someone would buy it for me, and my mom took the bait. :) Thanks, mom. You rock!
(You can get your very own tee here. For reference, I am wearing a large in these pics before washing/shrinking. Size UP.)
