Two winter coats

I've been MIA lately, sorry. Both our laptop and PC need new motherboards so I've been finding it difficult to get online much - the Hubby's phone is OK for reading the odd email but typing a blog post on it? I never realised just how fat my finger tips are! Fortunately my mother has left me her laptop for a few days while she goes down to London to visit my sisters so I am taking full advantage and have been online most of the day :D

The first project I have to show you is a pair of winter coats that I have made for Niece E and Toddler. My Princess and Monkey are pretty much set for coats this year thanks to hand me downs and the kindness of Grandma but Toddler and Niece E needed a little something to see them though to spring. Enter Ottobre (of course!) and pattern #14 from the Winter 2004 issue. The fabric has embroidered cord bonded to faux fur and it has been ageing in my stash for quite a while, I think I bought it from fabric.com two or three years ago. I had to cut Toddler's sleeves cross grain to squeeze both coats out of two yards but it looks absolutely fine so we'll call it a deliberate design feature ;P



I love the tulip shaped pockets. I lined them with quilting cotton as the fashion fabric would have been far too thick. My machine struggled to sew this in places! The hems and inside of the front facing are finished with 1" wide baby blue FOE (fold over elastic) which looks great, I'm glad I had enough left for both coats as it was so much easier to apply than bias biding would have been.



If you peep underneath that front overlap you will find the zipper. The pattern is designed for buttons and as such the overlap isn't very wide, it just covers the zipper tape and no more. After one abortive attempt at button holes though the zip was definitely the best way to go even though it's not the neatest looking finish.



Looking at the inside view, you can see that I've simply sewn the zip on along the centre front line on either side. Definitely not neat but very functional and really, who else but me (and now you ;P) knows that it wasn't intended that way?



And here are a couple of modelled shots courtesy of Toddler herself. It's a little wide on her (Ottobre's fabric was, I think, much thicker than mine so I have more ease than intended) but it leaves lots of room for layers underneath and doesn't restrict her movement at all. The hood makes a great collar when it's down and protects the back of her neck from the wind and when it's up she looks like a little pixie, it is very pointy!