The Beauty and the Beast

I felt like sewing yesterday.  I went in and did my wee bit of patching and another bit of ironing and then kept working on the yellow blouse.  When I paused I had all the picky bits, the bits with interfacing done.  It was time to get to the main assembly.

The back yoke was attached without any problems and the burrito roll was just as fun as the first time I did it.  After the very finished look of the hidden seams from burrito rolling, I put the collar on and I swear to you it was utterly flawless.  I mean really perfect.  The marks all matched.  The ends of the two piece collar just fitted ever so perfectly.  It takes just one small wrong move to get a fold stuck into the seam and I had none of it.  I sewed down the inside of the collar and it was just as perfect as you could hope for.  It went so smoothly.

Then I put on the sleeves.  Well one sleeve.  There is always a bit of ease required for a sleeve and just went perfectly.  No folds, no puckers, no little blips of excess showed.  It just all lay perfectly flat when it was done.  I could hardly believe this was me sewing because it was so right, so cleanly good.  That is my failing you see, that lack of perfection that effortless sewers and quilt top piecers have.  But it was just so right, so utterly right.  I finished the edges on the seam with great care.  By this time, I did not want to mess anything up.  I turned to the ironing board with a very full heart, to give it a good press before completing the  long side seam, laid it all out nice and straight and saw this.

My beautiful sleeve seam is attaching the right side of the sleeve to the wrong side of the front. I just backed away, turned off the sewing machine, unplugged the iron.  I just couldn't.  I only stopped to take a picture so I could look at it in a few minutes again and show myself that yes, this is really how it is.

This is a fabric with no right side that I can figure out.  It has been a bit of a struggle all along.  It is possible that my shirt fronts are attached to the wrong sides.  I wouldn't really know.  

The saving grace might be the particular construction of this shirt.  It is possible that if I just redo the darts and make the right side this side that I won't need to recut and redo the whole sleeve.  Before I can decide if I can get away with this cheat, I need to look at the front button plackets.  I sewed them a bit differently than the pattern called for due to the nature of my all sides are good fabric but that may save me here.  My two plackets match exactly.

If that is done well, then I think I might just do the quick fix.  It will make only place you can really tell rights from wrongs by the difference in the way the collar is attached on the 'inside' and the 'outside'.  Who knows which are which, except for that bit of sewing that will show at the back of my neck.  And if I unpicked that bit, and did a wee bit of hand sewing, would make it look exactly the same. 

That will be this afternoons job.   I will be ready then to face the beauty and the beast of it all.