Butterick 4213

Good morning!

Its time for my first post. This will be a blog about the things in life that keep me going, the stuff I want to do, as opposed to the stuff I have to do. Right now there are 3 passions in my life: my sewing, my garden and my chickens. Each varies in importance with the time of year and my mood. It is now winter, so of course the sewing is taking center stage. What better motivation to get into the sewing room than below zero weather? So without any further ado, here is my first project:

As you can see its a coat, my first! Should be done just in time for the warmer weather. (Timing is not my forte) And not just any coat but one straight out the 50's, unprinted pattern and all.  I am making the long version, without the hood. Pattern had to be up sized from a 34" bust to a 42", which took two weeks in itself. You can see upsized pattern in the background of first photo below. I have just hit the muslin stage:

My husband said I looked like a Jedi before the collar was applied. After the collar was on, I was magically transformed into Dracula apparently. Gotta love an honest man! He is right, there is a LOT of ease in this swing coat, the hem is over 3 YARDS wide. But it is growing on me, this is a coat to twirl in. I know bigger girls should not wear over sized clothes, but I think(hope) this will drape pretty gracefully in the wool melton I have. The pattern is drafted well, and I think pretty simple for a first tailoring project. Hope I am right, I would hate to waste the time and fabric, you know. Here is picture of the shoulder pads I had to make for the muslin fitting. It is old school all right, but fun to make:

After sewing a cover on and quilting/ stab stitching the padding together, I cut apart from one pointed end to the other. Voila!, two shoulder pads.