DIY Baby Boy Vest and Bow Tie {Stash-buster Project}

What's cuter than a little boy in a vest and bow tie? Not much! Though the tiny baby teeth peeking out in the picture below certainly up the cuteness factor :)

While I was making a dress for LMS for her baptism (I'll post it soon, I'm just waiting on an old picture from my mom), I was thinking about a new outfit for The Little Mister as well. I decided he needed a vest and bow tie, and I'd make them for him.

I've seen little boy vests in blogland, so I just had to do a little search to decide on a pattern/tutorial. I ended up using a pattern I found here and combined it with a tutorial I found here. I shortened the length of the pattern since it was intended for a one year old and adjusted the angle from the shoulder to the first button to make it a little longer (I wanted the first button to be a little lower).

The tutorial that went with the pattern called for topstitching the lining to the outside fabric at the armholes, but that wasn't working for me, so I ended up using the tutorial I found here, instead, which called for handsewing the shoulder seams closed. I admit to taking the quick route and machine sewing them, but it turned out well enough that I'm leaving it as-is.

The outer fabric came from a pair of pants I found at Goodwill, the lining was fabric I already had, and the buttons came off an old pair of Mr M's khakis. The fabric had a bit of stretch to it, which is why topstitching the armholes didn't work out. You can see that I couldn't get the pocket flaps to line up right either, but it's less obvious, so after a couple re-dos I left them alone.

You can't see it, but the back of the vest utilizes the hem and side seam of one of the pant legs, which made less work for me :)

The second part of this project was making a cute bow tie. Most of the tutorials I found were for cotton fabric, though I did find some for turning a grown-up tie into a little boy tie. I knew I wanted to use real tie fabric, and I was able to make this tutorial work.

We don't have any extra ties sitting around right now (we're not sure where all Mr M's old ties disappeared to), so I found a clearance tie at Kohls. I meant to get one at Goodwill earlier that day but got distracted by LMS and forgot. Though honestly, I doubt the ties there were as cute as this one :)

I cut off the narrow tail of the tie and carefully took it apart and ironed it flat. From there I was able to use this tutorial. Instead of sewing snaps to the tie and shirts, though, I attached some elastic.

modeling the first version 

TLM wore the vest and bow tie twice while we were in Colorado, and while the vest didn't have any issues, the bow tie did. It ended up getting kind of smooshed, instead of keeping its shape.

When we got home, I took the bow tie apart and ironed some narrow strips of stiff Pellon to the inside back of the fabric to help the edges keep their shape better. I also changed the center gather a little, which should also help the bow tie keep its shape.

After wearing it during church on Sunday, it still looked as good as new:

Such a handsome little boy!