A lot of the sewing I do is for Little Miss or myself, but it’s nice to make something up for the Teenager and for Wining Husband from time to time, too. Actually, my honey-do list for my husband is quite long, and I’d better get on that. Add this shirt to that list – but I have everything ready to go for it! The Patterns for Pirates Men’s Henley T-Shirt pictured to the left is the one I made as a pattern tester for my teenager. If you’ve ever sewn for a teenager, then you know that it’s sometimes quite the adventure.
We started out our adventure at Hancock Fabrics (Affiliate link), wandering through the aisles. The sales people there are getting to know us. I’m in there all the time. We went to the knits, and I had my son start looking through them.
“Ew.”
“This is too bright.”
“UGH, I don’t like the feel of this one.”
After a few of these, I saw the gold, and the gray and said to the teenager, “Hey, this looks good together, and gold is one of your school colors.”
“I don’t know,” responded the teenager. “I don’t think so.” And he wrinkled his nose and kept looking…making commentary as he looked. Meanwhile, my husband quickly found the fabric he liked for his shirt in the clearance area.
Fast forward about an hour. I’d picked up what I needed for the Alice in Wonderland dress I made (and still need to finish), and we all wandered back over to the knits…where the teenager picked out this yellow fabric…then, after about 15 more minutes of not being satisfied with the black knit…picked out this very. same. gray. jersey. knit. I’d pointed out to him. Sigh. I think they do these things as their silly way of letting moms know they love us.
I got home, threw the fabrics into the washer, printed and taped and cut out the pattern, and got started on things. Like all of Judy’s patterns I’ve made, this was an easy and straightforward pattern. In fact, had my machine NOT died on me while I was wrangling the collar, I would have been done with the shirt in about 2 hours. However, my machine decided it would start making lovely little thread nests for me on the underside of the fabric.
I. Got. Mad.
So, I did what anyone would do. I wadded up the shirt and tossed it into the corner. Let out a grunt of disgust with my machine, turned the machine off. Stood up, went and had some coffee, then came back to it all. I tried changing out my needle, since this is usually the culprit behind evil bird nests of thread syndrome. I then completely rethreaded my machine.
Nope. That didn’t work. I then took the bobbin area apart, dusted, checked for rogue threads, and then put everything back together. Then, I grabbed my scrap test fabric, and that didn’t work.
I informed my husband that I might need to take the machine into the “spa.”
I took a deep breath, and set my attention to ripping the collar off so that I could try again without nests. I got the collar off, tried rewinding the bobbin, tested things out on the scrap fabric, and it looked like I was good to go.
I wasn’t. The bird nests happened again.
I played with different thread tensions from the upper thread, since when it nests on the bottom, it’s an indicator that there’s something wrong on top.
That didn’t help. At this point, I decided when I got back to work I’d cut a new collar, since the third time, was NOT the charm.
I informed Judy that my machine was down for the count, and I wouldn’t have the modeled pictures until I could get the machine fixed. I took some pictures for fit so that she could see what needed to be adjusted on the pattern. I then stewed for a couple of days and let the machine have a break – and let myself have a break from it. The reason we didn’t take it in immediately is simple: Our microwave also broke last week. After a week of being unable to heat up leftovers (a staple in a household with two working adults, one of them pregnant, a teenager, and a toddler), the microwave took priority over the sewing machine. Plus, we had a weekend full of activities. The teenager had a cross country meet AND homecoming dance (and we needed to find him some dress shoes for that) and the pumpkin patch was calling our names.
So, early Monday morning, I woke up. There is nothing I dislike more than not being able to finish something I started. I was ready to do one more search on tips for avoiding the bird’s nest. I found one:
If you’re sewing through thicker fabric or seams, lengthen your stitch size to 4 or 5 if you’re getting birds nests on the back of the fabric.
I wish I could tell you where I found that. It was somewhere. I took a deep breath. I changed out my needle again for luck. I ripped off the third attempt at putting the collar on. I rethreaded the machine and cleaned down below in the bobbin and feed dog area. I took another deep breath, recut the collar, pinned it into place, and I was ready to go. I elongated the zigzag length to 4 (the max my Brother SE400 would let me) over the top of the button placket and placket seams. And BAM! I was good to go. I held my breath for a minute as I got the hems ready – for some reason, I’ve started to feel nervous about them, and this is a shirt I wanted my son to be able to wear to school and feel confident in. They were done, and I sewed on the buttons, and whoo. I’m so happy with how the shirt came out, and despite how it looks (he was quite tired this morning before heading off to school), he really likes his shirt. I’m going to have to make him a few more in other colors…once I’m ready to brave picking fabric out with him again.
The Men’s Henley from Patterns for Pirates goes on sale today for $6.50. Women’s Henley and kids’ Henley patterns are both also releasing today for the same price – or you can purchase all three for $18 through the weekend on the Patterns For Pirates website. The men’s pattern ranges from size XXS-XXXL. Options include: T-shirt or Henley neckband, short sleeve, 3/4 rolled up sleeve, or long sleeve with thumbhole cuffs options, banded or hemmed, there is a hood option, and there are cut lines for short, average, and tall lengths. It’s a versatile pattern, for sure. Here’s the one I made!
