congrats shirt, and moving news

I relinquished some sewing time from my own greedy projects and (finally) made a boy shirt for the boy friend. 

Can you understand why he's my b/f? Well, we both have a shared love for blue garments. Isn't that enough to keep the flame a-burnin'?

Also, he's a smarty pants. Corey was offered full-ride tuition plus a stipend to attend the Villanova University Graduate English Program this coming fall. Bravo babe! Here's a shirt. I hope it holds up during all his strenuous ventures in book-reading and essay-writing and theory-debunking and whatever else grad students do besides sit in coffee shops with their laptops, sighing.

rolled-up smarty pants

Villanova is in a township directly outside Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Philly, as in historic & probably haunted ye-olde-founding-fathers America. As in, the city of cheesesteaks and processed cream cheese. As in, Will Smith's home town. 

man, parents still don't understand

Those are all reasons enough for me to decide to move there with him. Why not, right? I'm young and carefree and ready to try out living in a big city that has big city things, like trains and angry people on their cell phones walking quickly through crosswalks. Also, we already endured five-ish years of a long-distance relationship so we're not doing that to ourselves again. We really enjoyed Philly when we visited last month so I think it's a good choice for us. It's home to the Urban Outfitters/Anthroplogie headquarters, after all... and is close enough to NYC for extravagant fabric shopping sprees.

So that's that. We expect to move in early August. If you're from there or know anyone there or have any advice for an out-of-state move in general, please let me know!  (Thanks already for your tips on neighborhoods to look at, Maddie!) Meanwhile on this side of the Mason-Dixon line, I will be panicking silently and eventually not-so-silently about jobs and apartments.

Back to the shirt. This pattern is McCall's 6044, which is a casual, simple and straight-forward men's pattern. I tried the Colette Negroni twice before, but had trouble getting it to fit him and was frustrated by all the little details that surely make a nice shirt but were just giving me a headache. After I accidentally serged a hole in the front of Negroni #2 and almost cried, Corey revealed to me that he prefers a shirt with a traditional collar stand and collar anyway. Fine. Does anyone want a Negroni pattern (all sizes and pattern pieces intact, since I traced them)? I'll send it to you if you so kindly cover the shipping. It's truly a great pattern for someone who's not me (i.e. too lazy to be so selfless).

So after seeing M6044 recently sewn up by True Bias and Beau Baby for their charming husbands, I thought I'd give it a shot. I had to alter the medium size a little bit because the shoulders were too wide and the length too long (thus the bottom button being so low, because I shortened it after everything was already sewn). Otherwise I'm a big fan of the pattern because 1) There are no flat-felled seams. 2) There's no yoke (unless you choose that particular view). 3) The sleeve placket on the long-sleeve version is just a simple cut-out V. 4) The shirt is fairly slim-fitting which is my guy's style, and 5) The model on the envelope is kinda handsome, despite his c.2001 gelled hair fluff.

I was relieved that Corey requested the short-sleeve version, as it made my job lovingly performed task even easier. He's super picky about the design and colors of his plaid fabrics, so after a long search online, it was surprising to us both that JoAnn of all places had exactly what he wanted. It's one of their "homespun" cottons that are tucked somewhere in the quilting section. It was more difficult than I expected to work with, because it became misshapen easily and was resistant to gliding under the presser foot. Thus it took a LOT of pinning so everything stayed in place while I matched and sewed the plaids.

laughing at a dude laughing at our photo shoot

Sewn for any men lately? Would you like to? I'm serious about that Negroni, by the way... If there's enough interest, I'll draw names for it. Otherwise it'll just go to the first person who calls dibs. ;)
UPDATE 6/12/12: I ended up drawing names for the Negroni and it went to Little Miss S all the way in Denmark. Enjoy!