Hawk eye and two refashions

Last year at the local ploughing festival, my husband and our neighbour were talking to someone there who had a display of birds of prey.  As they were chatting it emerged that they use them for rabbiting, and as we're snided out with rabbits, it was arranged for them to come and see if they could thin them out a bit.
They came last week but the rain was so bad, they didn't stop long.  It's a beautiful day today, so much nicer for the birds.  Here's one of them which is a Harris Hawk

They have ferrets to flush the rabbits out but I don't know how they got on because I had to go out.

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This is one of two identical blouses I got from the charity shop for £1 each.  Well identical in all but colour, the other one is in pinks (more about that another day).
I don't think they have ever been worn and as you can see it's quite big - I think it might even be maternity wear because it's supposed to be my size.

Most of the fullness comes from beneath rows of pin tucks at the top of the front.  This wasn't just where the pin tucks ended though, the pin tucks were a sort of bib and there was a separate piece of fabric gathered onto it.  This made it very easy to unpick the gathered bit, flatten it out and restitch it on, whilst also making a vertical seam  to accommodate the spare fabric.  It then only needed a couple of darts in the back.
I didn't like the three quarter length sleeves so I shortened them and also the bottom.

I toyed with the idea of taking a collar off a plain blue blouse I haven't worn for years and attaching it to this, but then decided against it.
Apart from the bit I cut off the bottom and the sleeves, I had some other bits and bobs left over.  There was a narrow tie belt and a couple of those tabs for when the sleeves were rolled up.  It was when I took the tabs off, that I had what I thought was a brilliant idea, and it concerned the aforementioned blue blouse.
Here is said blouse (the collar's turned up because I only remembered to take a photo after I'd started on it)

It doesn't button all the way to the top and my ground breaking idea was to sew the sleeve tabs to the inside of the stand up part of the collar like so

I didn't like the sleeves because the cuffs were fastened like they do with cufflinks, but using two buttons.  This made them stick out and it was hard to get a cardi over them.  So I shortened them and used the cuffs off the other blouse to finish them off like so

I then sewed the tie belt onto the blouse in a random design 

 and the finished article looks like this

I was really pleased with it and the colour suits me, but when I showed my husband he said I looked like a nurse or I worked in a care home!

The thing is, now he's said it I can see where he's coming from.  I think it's the blue colour and maybe the cuffs, but surely not the swirly bits?

What do you think, does it look like I've just come home from a 10 hour shift on the ward?
If it does can you suggest anything to rectify it?  I've still got the sleeves left to play with.

Be honest, I don't mind if you agree with him!