Bat Wing Top

Halloween is almost here! Can you believe it? 
I mean, it's finally October, which is Halloween month. We start decorating around mid-September and my whole house gets transformed into a "haunted mansion". Halloween is my most favorite holiday ever!! After Thanksgiving of course, because... mashed potatoes and pumpkin pie. Yum! 

Any-who, I want to share a fun top that you can make in a jiffy. You can wear it at home or around town, to the office, or trick or treating with your little ones. I recently made it and had to share it! It's too dang cute to keep it a secret.

Quick, grab the FREE Gone Batty top from Patterns for Pirates here. Then, click here for the sewingtutorial. It's the cutest!! Talk about a last-minute costume that's appropriate for work and/or school. You can wear it as an everyday top as well. It comes in one size fits most, so no fussy fitting issues to worry about. All the wins with this one! Yes, please!!

I've had a long history of bats through caving experiences and I've grown to love them most of all. Bats are my favorite Halloween creature. When I saw this pattern last year (why did I wait so long??) I had to have it. Umm... a shirt with bat wings, yes please! Bonus, you could even sew white topstitching thread to make it a spiderweb instead, if you wanted. Oooohhh maybe that'll be next year's project. 

What you need:

• P4P Gone Batty PDF pattern 
• 1 5/8 yard of Knit fabric
• Sewing machine with zigzag stitch
• Sewing supplies and notions
• Halloween music playing in the background (this is a must)

Put your PDF pattern pages together matching the letters at the ends. Tape the pages together and then cut out the pattern shape. Make sure your knit fabric is washed. Knit shrinks. Toss it in the wash on a quick wash setting and warm water. Dry your fabric on a warm setting too. Get all the shrinkage out of the way first.

The top is cut out like a circle skirt. You fold your fabric in half and then, in half again. You can use the whole pattern or use the cut-out shapes to make the "wings" along the hem. Sounds simple, right? It is! 
 

I opted for the full PDF pattern. It should look like this once taped together.

Cut our your pattern pieces following the large dotted lines. Sew easy!

After your pieces are cut out, grab your fabric. Time to trace it off. 

The fabric was a smidge smaller than the pattern piece, but I made it work.

Cut out the bat top and neckband pieces.

So, I ran into a teeny weeny problem. The knit I bought was 60" wide. Well, after I washed it, it shrank about 2". In the above photo on the left, you can see the pattern runs off the fabric. I traced that scallop to the end of the fabric. See... gotta make sure you wash your knit. It shrinks like crazy. 

Time to Sew

The pattern instructions have you take your high hip measurement and divide by 4. I got 9". You find the center line and draw a line out to the side from that. 
Then, you make an angled line 12" up from that line. There weren't any exact measurement points for these, so you eyeball it. 

Now, this is where I urge you to use a chalk marker and baste where your stitch lines are supposed to be. I found out the hard way, the top would not fit me according to these loose measurements. I was blessed in the bust department and couldn't get the top over my body. LOL! After unpicking black thread on knit fabric for 30+ minutes, I wanted to share this little piece of advice with you. 

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Sorry about the blurry photo, but this is how much I had to unpick. I re-drew the line and tapered it out about 1 inch. This gave me 4 extra inches total and ended up fitting perfectly.

You can see the slight angled out seam. This is the side seam and I needed more room that the instructions gave.

The instructions have you use the stretch stitch, which is the one that looks like a lightning bolt.

​I urge you to baste your side seams first. That stretch stitch is a pain in the butt to unpick. Especially when using the same color thread on knit fabric.

Save your eyeballs, please! 

After you've tried it on and it fits correctly in all the right places, go back and use the stretch stitch to sew your side seams. 
Then, sew the rest according to the directions. I used the stretch stitch for this too. 
​

Onto the neckband part. 

Sew the side seam by folding in half.

You're going to stretch the neckband a little to match the top. See the 3 layers? Make sure to get all 3.

Pull slightly so the band will fit the neck hole.

I don't remember reading the instructions anymore after this part. Oops! But, I went ahead and topstitched the neckband onto the top. I like the finish it gives. Use a regular zigzag stitch to do this if you'd like. 

It's a little rippled, but much less so after topstitching. It flattened out once I put it on.

I had so much fun making this top. And way more fun doing taking my photos!! I had fun music playing and danced around in my bat wing top. I think I'll live in this for the month of October! I love, love, love it!!! I was channeling my inner ghoul. 

So, what do you think? Are you itching to make one? 

If you need more Halloween sewing inspiration, make Trick or Treat bags or DIY Halloween home decor. I also made a Fall circle bag. It was a little fail, but cute nonetheless.


See ya later, I've gone Batty!! 

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