By the end of today, all that'll be left is a little topstitching and hand-sewing to finish off our cozy coat confection.

Shall we get busy?

You recall that one inch we put in at the top of the sleeve?  Now we're going to have to take it back out so the sleeve'll fit the armhole.  I think it's best to do that in the flattest way possible.  And the flattest thing I can think of is a box pleat.  So we'll put a little pleat in there that takes out 1" of fabric.  Remember how to do pleats?

Here they are, with the pleats all nicely put in there.  We'll put the "box" portion of the pleat on the wrong side, so these are technically inverted pleats, I reckon.

Now we'll just take these and sew them into the armholes.  In order to do that, I'll put one pin at each end, and one pin in the center.  We want the pleat to match up to the shoulder seam, see?

Then I'll just sew that seam, babying the sleeve into the armhole as I go.

And when we're done:

Seems almost a shame that this cutest sleeve has to go inside the coat, doesn't it?

Now we'll need to take the inch out of the top of the coat sleeve.  I think we'll do that with gathers.

To that end, we'll need to run gathering threads across the top half or so of the sleeve, pin it into the coat armhole:

And pull up the bobbin threads until it fits.  Stitch that baby down, and....

Nice!

Now we need to add the ruffle to the bottom of the sleeve.  There are (at least) two ways to do this.  You can apply it to the un-sewn sleeve hem, like this:

Or you can wait until you've sewn the underarm seam and do it then.  The difference is that doing it the way I've done it here, I'll have a seam to deal with in the back of the ruffle.  If you wait until you've sewn the underarm seam, you can overlap the ruffle ends, tapering them into the seam, thereby avoiding having a little seam there.  If that's something you fancy. 

Now I'll pin the whole side seam and underarm seam together, matching the sleeve hem, underarm seam, waist clip, and coat hem.  (Please still fit, please still fit...)

It still fits!

And now, of course, we'll sew that, from the hem, up to the armhole seam, and thence down to the sleeve hem. 

Then we'll sew the seams in the lining in the same way, excepting only that we'll leave about 10" open in the middle of one of the side seams so we can turn it all right side out in a minute. 

And now, because I have a more-or-less new serger, I serge the bottom of the ruffle strip.  

Not that having a serger makes me any better than anybody that doesn't have one, and in fact, since the fleece won't ravel, I could just turn up my hem and straight stitch it down.  Which is what I did on the short ends of the ruffle strip anyway, because by then I'd stolen one of the pink spools of thread to use on my sewing machine.  So the picture above is completely superfluous, is what I guess I'm saying.  Still, I have a serger and it does a cool stitch....

*sniff*

I turned the long edge of the ruffle strip up about 1/2" and straight stitched it.

Then I took the short end of the ruffle, and, matching the long edge to the coat hem, pinned it in place like so:

leaving a seam allowance on the front facing there.  Then I pulled up the ruffle strip bobbin threads, distributed the ruffles nicely, and sewed that puppy down.

Now I'm going to put the collar where it goes, which is attached to the neckline of the coat. 

I  matched the center backs, and sewed from the center back.  My husband says that the pins sticking out of the dress form's neck make it look like Frankenstein's monster, and in a way, I guess that's appropriate. 

Now.

Now we're going to put it all together.

Take a deep breath, close your eyes and center yourself, and let's do this thing.

First, we'll turn the lining right side out.

Then, we'll turn the coat inside out.

Then we'll pin their edges together, matching them at the neck center back, shoulder seams, front corners, the waist clips, and the hem edges. The hem ruffle is shoved upward between the two layers. 

And here we are all pinned together and ready to go.  (I'm awful glad nobody sees me this way.  Gives a whole new meaning to the word "pinup".)

Start at the neck center back again, and sew around the neck, pivot at the front, go down the facing, and go around the hem until you get to the center back.  Stop there, backstitch, and go back to the neckline to start over going the other way. 

This is going to make a really chubby seam.  Grade it like crazy. 

Now we'll take another deep breath, stand up and go get a drink, walk around for a minute, and then come back.  Reach your arm through that hole in the lining side seam, and tuuuurn the whole thing right side out.  Push the points out with some blunt object, pull on the hem ruffle to make the hem seam lie straight, and...and...look!

Now we'll tackle that capelet.  It's a little anticlimactic after all that coat jazz, but also little soothing to our nerves.

First we'll sew the ruffle to the hem:

Then we'll slap the coat fabric down on top of it and sew around the edge, leaving a few inches open at the neck edge for turning.  

Trim the seams, turn it inside out, and: 

That hem edge wants to stand out a little, doesn't it?

Now all that's left is:

Hand sewing the sleeve lining to the sleeves
Hand sewing the lining side seam closed
Making buttonholes
Sewing on the buttons

And we're done! We have birthed a coat.  I have this sense of accomplishment, of pride, of shared community oneness with all of you who've helped create this precious, pretty thing, and we're going to love it, and feed it, and get it all its shots, and one day it'll grow up and leave us to go away to college...

I'm getting all misty-eyed.  I really need a holiday. 

Tune in Monday morning for the final pictures, and have a lovely weekend!

~Erin~

"hobby: –noun, plural -bies.

Sewing is certainly not my "main occupation", and since it definitely qualifies in the pleasure and relaxation departments, it looks like I have a hobby on my hands.  How about for you?  Does sewing qualify?

Moving on from wondering to working, we'll start today by assembling our...

Coat Lining

I ought to mention, before we start sewing up all these seams like madpersons, that when I cut them out, I clipped the seam allowance at the waist.  That's so I'd know where the waist was.  Am I clever or what? 

(No need to answer, really.)

The waist clip is where all the action happens with these here princess seams. 

First, we're going to pin the side front panel to the front facing, matching the waist clips:

And, of course, sew that seam.  (You knew it was coming.)

Now we'll do that again on the other side of the front. 

And we'll sew the side back panels to the sides of the back. 

And what we'll end up with is this:

And this:

Here's a closer look at the princess seam.  It ends in the armhole, just like we drew it to. 

Now we're going to sew the front facings to the front edges of the lining.  No magic here.  If you remember, all we did to create the facing panel was to draw a line down the front pattern piece, cut it apart, and add seam allowances.  Now all we're going to do is put it back together. 

On both sides of the front.

Now, my dears, we're going to work on the...

Coat itself

We'll start by doing the back just like we did the lining back.  Pin the side panels to the back panel along the princess seam, matching the waist clip. 

Sew.

End up with this. 

See the flare we added at the bottom?  You can see it now, can't you?  (Us.  We.  We did that!!)

Now this is slightly more serious.  But only slightly so.

This is the same princess seam we've done over and over by now, but the pockets are sticking out of it.  And, if you think about it for a minute, you'll realize that one continuous seam is needed here.  We want to go down the seam, around the pocket, and on down to the hem.  (Or up.  I usually like to sew princess seams from the hem up.) 

So now we have this, right?  Seam pinned together, pocket sticking out and pinned together.  Where's the pocket stand?  It's sandwiched between the coat pieces there, poking toward the coat, not the pockets.  That's how it was sewn down, and that's where it wants to stay.

The waistline clip, by the way, is one seam-allowance-width below the top of the pocket.  That's also where the top of the stand is.

So we'll sew along the seam until we get to the stand (which we'll know the location of by feel), turn the corner, go around the pocket until we hit the edge of the stand again, turn carefully, and finish that seam. 

Still breathing?  Breathe while you sew or you'll pass out.  And don't think the kids will worry about you.  The second you're out they're making off with your scissors.    

When we turn the seam over, *pop*!  Out pops our little stand, exactly where it's supposed to be.

Now we need to sew the pocket stand down along the topstitching we did on it yesterday. 

But.

This is an area of the coat fabric that's going to take a lot of abuse.  It would behoove us, at this point, to add a little strength to those stress points. 

So I've taken scraps of the lining fabric, pressed interfacing to the back of them, and pinked the edges.  Then I've pinned them on the wrong side of the coat fabric where the stand needs to be sewn.

Now we'll turn it over and stitch over the stitching, just on the ends.  At the very corner, I turned 45 degrees and laid one stitch right to the corner.  And backstitched over and over that one stitch several times.  That's the stitch that'll take the most abuse.

My helpful thread tails there will show you the beginnings and ends of my stitching.

And now we have a cosy little pocket that'll live between the lining and fleece of our coat, and hold her cold little hands and all her treasures.  (My daughter generally carries Matchbox cars around in her pockets.  I think the three brothers have affected her, somehow.)

Shoulder Seams

The last thing to do for today is the shoulder seams.  We'll just sew the lining fronts to the back at the shoulder seam, give the coat the same treatment, and call it a day. 

Now, where I come from we have a holiday this weekend.  So here's our plan.  We'll finish up the construction of this coat tomorrow, (Wednesday the 25th), and I'll leave you for the weekend to cook massive amounts of food and enjoy your holiday.  Then, on Monday the 30th, when the holiday's over and we all need a little pick-me-up, I'll post the final pictures and announce the fabric winner. 

THEN, on the first day of December, we'll have another giveaway, portending, of course, another design project, but this time the giveaway will be completely random.  And the fabric will be red.  And it will have been made by worms.

Oh yes, you'll want to be here.

Until tomorrow, then,

~Erin~

I wish you could've been here.  But you're here now, and the cutting was actually pretty hum-drum to watch, so we're skipping ahead to the sewing.  Ah, the sewing....

Moving on.  Honestly.

Today we're going to jump right in at the deep end and make the collar.  Now, the collar is worth spending a little extra tongue-biting time over, because it's really the focal point of the coat.  Get it right, and the whole coat could look right.  (I say could, because you could still botch it, too.)  Get it wrong, and even if the rest of the coat looks tack-sharp, the collar will spoil it. 

So.

Collar

After thinking it over, it occurred to me that I did not, in fact, have to cut the undercollar in two pieces in order to get my little v-shaped shaving right in the center back.  Remember?  We talked about that here.  I just put the center back of that pattern on the fold and everything worked out.

First thing to do is get the undercollar and the collar sewn together at the outer edge. 

They're different shapes, these two, so in order to fit them together, we'll pin them at the center back/outer edge, and sew from there around the curve to the neckline edge at the front.  While we're doing that, we're pulling and shaping the undercollar to the collar.  It'll do that, since most of the edge is on the bias there.  Then we'll go back to the center back and do the other side, shaping as we go.

When we've done that, we end up with this:

Now.  At this point, do not. DO NOT panic and grab your scissors and cut off the little bit of the collar that's peeking out at the neckline.  It's okay, we put it there.  Don't let's forget and take it off again. 

Grade that seam allowance.  In this bulky fabric, it's not just the layers that we're going to grade. 

See how the fleece ends up being a different length on the top and the bottom?  Also, see how I'm not clipping the curves?  This weakens the seams, and never ends up looking like I want it to, so I just trim seam allowances on curves on the thin side and they usually don't complain. 

Then we'll turn it, and press the edge, rolling the undercollar slightly to the inside. 

Next, starting at the center back of the neckline, we'll baste the two necklines together, pulling the undercollar to fit the collar. 

Now, in order to see how our collar is going to look on this dress form,  (it's really just a display mannequin, I know, I know, but "dress form" is quicker to say than "display mannequin" every time, so we'll pretend, okay?)  we'll have to pin it first up like this:

"Like a pink vampire," my son says.  Remember how we pinned the collar on the Autumn A-line dress flat?  That's because we were going to attach it to the neckline of the dress and put bias binding over the edge.  This time the collar is going between the coat and lining, so in order to visualize it as a finished product, we'll have to pin it upward first. 

Then, when we pull it down, we get this:

So cute!  And it lies good and flat at the front bottom edge, because of all that pulling we did with the undercollar. 

A closer look at the "roll" we were going for when we overlapped the pattern at the shoulder:

Very nice!

Details

Now we'll just cover our six buttons with the lining fabric:

And make ourselves a bunch of ruffle:

The ruffle is just strips of fabric , 2 1/2" wide, joined at the ends and folded wrong sides together.  Then I ran them under my shirring foot.  You could, of course, do the old loosened-bobbin-tension song and dance, but if you're going to do any amount of ruffling, I strongly recommend getting some type of ruffling attachment for your sewing machine. 

Pocket Stands

Now we need to do those pocket stands. 

I told you that we'd need four pocket stand pieces, but in this particular fabric I decided to use six.  We want these babies really stiff. 

So I cut six, and interfaced two.  If you had stiffer interfacing than I had on hand, you could perhaps get away with only doing one.  I had fairly wimpy stuff, so I did two:

Then I sandwiched the un-interfaced piece between the right sides of the interfaced pieces and sewed three edges, leaving the edge that goes to the coat seam open:

And, as you see, clipped the corners.  Grading this seam would also probably be a good idea.

Turned them inside out, pushed the corners out with all my might (and a blunt pencil), pressed them good fashion, and topstitched close to the edge:

The pins are there to show me where the front and bottom of each one was.  They started looking eerily similar after a while. 

Now, because I don't want to lose these little tiny babies, I'm going to go ahead and baste them where they go.  This is the front panel, and the clip I made at the waistline is right at the top of the pocket stand. 

And now, because I don't want to lose the pocket pieces, which are also small, and which I also sometimes end up cutting more of instead of searching for endlessly, I'll baste those where they go:

The pocket on the top piece there (the front panel) is pulled back a little to show you where it goes in relation to the pocket stand.  See how there's a seam allowance above and below the stand?  Baste that sucker down.  The other piece goes in the corresponding spot on the side front panel. 

Excellent!  We're well on our way.  Now we have the collar ready to go, our ruffles and buttons in waiting, and our pockets at the starting gate.  Tomorrow we'll start with sewing up the princess seams, and then Pinky here will start to take shape. I can hardly wait!

Questions?

~Erin~

Let's get to that point, shall we?  We can cover all the remaining minutiae today, and then we'll be able to get ahold of those scissors.  That fabric.  Mmm.  

The last pattern piece that we need is the capelet. 

We'll create the capelet pattern the same way that we made the collar pattern on day 7.  Only differences here are that we won't overlap the shoulder seam (because we don't want it to roll) and we'll make it about 10" long from the neck. 

I've cut it a little back from the center front there.  I think the center edge of it can just hide under the collar. 

Now we need to write a list of the pattern pieces we need in each fabric, and puzzle them around on paper. 

Coat Fabric:
Back (1 on fold)
Front (2)
Sleeve (2)
Front facing (2)
Capelet (1 on fold)
Collar (1)
Hem ruffle (1)

So it looks like we'll need 44" of coat fabric. I decided, after much soul-searching, that I could move the collar pattern up over there to the right of the side front, thereby saving myself 8" of fabric.  44" is just shy of 1 1/4 yards.  

Now we need to to do the same thing for the lining.

Lining Fabric:

Back (1 on fold)
Front (2)
Sleeve (2)
Side back (2)
Side front (2)
Collar lining (2)
Capelet (1 on fold)
Pockets (4)

We also need four pocket stand pieces, and ruffles for the sleeve and capelet hems.  We'll stick the sleeve stands in wherever there's a little space, since they're pretty tiny, and add 1/4 yd for the ruffles.  So, we end up needing just shy of 1 3/4 yards. 

Now, I think the rough outline for sewing this beast together goes something like this:

(Don't you love how sometimes what we're sewing is our "baby", other times it's a "beast"?  Pretty much the truth about sewing, isn't it?)

1)  Get all the little bits ready-Collar, ruffles, buttons, pockets and pocket stands
2)  Sew all the princess seams, inserting the pockets.  Sew facings to lining.
3)  Shoulder seams
4)  Armhole seam
5)  Join the lining and coat body
6)  Side seams
7) Capelet
8)  Finishing-topstitching, buttonholes, buttons, and possibly a scrappy flower pin

There.  That doesn't look so hard, does it?  It'll be an adventure.  We'll do it together. 

Next week-we sew!

Reaching out for my scissors,
~Erin~

Yesterday we got as far as finishing the collar pattern.  Today we'll start with the collar lining.  Here we go. 

The collar itself will be cut in one piece, and end up looking like a big, rounded rainbow.  The collar lining will be cut in half at the center back and the following modifications made:

-1/8" shaved off the outer edge, starting at center back and tapering out as it comes around the front curve.

-1/8" shaved off the inner edge of the center back as shown, tapering out at the outer collar edge.

These little shavings will ensure that our collar rolls under in both directions. 

Now we need to fiddle with the...

Closure

Drafting a double-breasted closure is simply a matter of taping two bodice fronts together (or tracing one front and flipping it over) and marking the new edge.   

I'll also flatten out that point that the new edge and the neckline made. 

Style Lines

This is sort of a catchall list item, where we consider any seams that aren't strictly functional, and any little bits that don't go anywhere else.  Such as our pockets. 

Now, in order to know where our pockets can go, we need to look at where our buttons are going to go.  If we're going to do that, we're going to need to know where our facing is going to go.  Because in a double-breasted coat, the facing needs to be deep enough so that all the buttons will grab it.  You follow?

So.  Backing up. 

Here's what our coat front looks like now that we've claimed some of the right coat front to make it double-breasted. 

The facing should start at the shoulder seam, and should take up about 1/3 of that seam.  Then it curves down toward the hem.  I put the buttons on there where I want them, distributed evenly from the waistline up to the neckline, and evenly on either side of the center front. 

Now I can see where I'll put the pocket.  When I grab my child and hold the pattern up against her, I discover that her hand will rest comfortably in a pocket that begins at the waistline. 

I'll lay a piece of paper over my pattern at that level and draw in the shape for the pocket. 

So now we've accomplished a couple of things.  We've got the pocket pattern and placement, we've got the button placement, and we've got the facing pattern.  We need to trace the facing pattern onto a separate piece of paper and label it.  What's left of the front becomes the lining pattern. 

Because we're going to sandwich a ruffle between the lining and coat fabric at the sleeve edge and hem, I'm going to make the lining and the coat the same length.  If we weren't, the lining would be shorter (by the hem width) than the coat.

Now we'll put a little scrap of paper under the seam there and draw our pocket stand.  Its outer edge is parallel to the princess seam, its short edges matching the pocket opening. 

Skirt

The "skirt" for our coat is just a deep ruffle.  It'll need to be 6"+1/2" for a hem, + seam allowance on the top edge.  I'm not sure how much the fleece will gather, or how ruffly we actually want it, so we'll have to play with the length.  We'll start out, I think, with a strip that's 1.5 times the length of the coat hem and go down from there. 

Seam and Hem Allowance

Now the only thing that remains is to carefully add seam allowances to all our pieces and mark them.  Since we're not technically hemming the coat, but only adding a ruffle, the coat and lining each just need a seam allowance at the bottom.  Sleeves, ditto.  We do need to remember, though, that each pattern piece needs to be labeled with its title, the name of our project (i.e. "pink coat"), the number of pieces to cut, the grainline, and the seam allowance. 

Whew! All done with that pattern!  Tomorrow we'll do the capelet pattern and talk about the layout, yardage estimate, and order of operations for sewing our lovely pink baby together. 

Deal? Deal.

Questions?  Comments?  Let me know.

~Erin~

1) Waist

2) Armhole/Sleeve

3) Neckline

4) Closure

5) Style Lines

6) Skirt

7) Seam and Hem Allowance

Waist

Now, with a princess style, the checklist item "waist" tells us to get the princess lines completely done.  First we'll need to transfer the dart from the basic pattern to the coat pattern.  Because we've decided to move the side front seams over closer to the side seam, I'm going to match the patterns up at the side seam and the waist seam, like so:

And draw the dart on the coat pattern. 

 Now, how we go from basic coat pattern to princess-lines pattern is described in detail in the "Princess Styles" lesson on the lessons page.  Here I added 7" in length from the waist, because I want the final length of the coat to be 24", 6" of which will be ruffle, and the bodice was already 11" long.  I'm measuring from the shoulder/neckline point. 

I also added 1/2" width at each side of the side front and side back seams, and the side seams.  We don't want a bunch of flare, and we have 6 seams that we've added 1/2" width to each side of, so we've added 6" in width. 

 Sleeve

We went back and forth on adding puff at the top of the sleeve, but since we need the extra width because of our non-slippery lining, I think we'll go ahead and add a little.  I cut the sleeve pattern down the middle from top to hem and added 1" at the sleeve cap.  It tapers out to nothing at the hem. 

See how the hem now has a sharpish angle?  I'll either redraw that curve to smooth it out, or just smooth it out with my scissors as I cut. 

Usually, if we're adding a ruffle, we'd want to shorten the sleeve by the length of the ruffle.  I think I'll leave the sleeve wrist length, and allow the ruffle to extend over the hand a bit.  It's only going to be a 1" ruffle or so. 

 Neckline/Collar

There are many types of coat collars.  You can read about quite a few of them at this fascinating site.  We're going to go with a simple approach, and use a rolled Peter Pan collar for our coat. 

If you were with us when we drafted the Autumn A-line Collar, you'll remember that we made that collar completely flat.  This time we'd like it to roll quite a bit.  More about collars, of course, is available in the collars lesson on the lessons page.  I've overlapped the shoulder 2" to make the collar roll, then drafted a very wide collar in the shape I want. 

Next time we'll talk about the collar lining, and then we'll move on to the closure.  Questions?

~Erin~

In case you missed this part of the Autumn A-line dress, here's a quick recap:

We're going to make our coat out of the basic bodice pattern, altered a little bit.  So first we'll need to choose which size of bodice pattern we need.  Measure around the chest, choose a basic pattern size, and print it out:

I suppose you could really use any pattern you wanted, if you were reasonably convinced that it was "basic".  By which I mean, it fits the child in question, with a minimal amount of ease (ours have 10% ease around the chest) and is free of any style lines that are going to confuse you.  Basic.  Bodice.  Pattern.  That's what we want to start with. 

If you do use the CFW basic pattern, you'll have to print it and slap it into shape:

That's better!  Now we can start to make a coat pattern. 

Bodice Adjustments

In order to make our basic bodice pattern into a coat pattern, we'll need to make a few adjustments.  We make these adjustments 1) because a coat has to be big enough to go over other (sometimes bulky) clothing, and 2) a coat is usually made out of a bulky fabric.

Now, the adjustments we're making today are average adjustments, which means if you're using thinner fabric, or want a more fitted coat, you can go less, and if you're using bulkier fabric, you'd use slightly larger measurements.  Ours is a heavyweight fleece, but still a more-or-less medium weight coating fabric, so we'll use these measurements.  These adjustments come almost straight from the book Childrenswear Design by Hilde Jaffe and Rosa Rosa.  (I'd hate for you to think I came up with all this.)

First we'll lay down our basic pattern and trace around it.  Then we'll make the adjustments shown in red. 

a) Lower the neckline 1/8"

b)  Draw a line from the new neckline extending out over the shoulder.  At the armhole edge of the shoulder, it should be 1/4" above the original shoulder. 

c)  The new shoulder line should extend 3/4" beyond the original armhole.

d)  Drop the bottom of the armhole 1".

e)  Add 1" in width at the side seam.

Now grab the bodice back and make the same adjustments. 

Sleeve Adjustments

After that, we'll need to adjust the sleeve pattern a bit.  I've shown a short sleeve here, just to save space, but you'd of course be using a long sleeve.

a) Cut the sleeve down the middle and add 1" in width. 

b)  Add 1" in height at the top of the sleeve cap.  Now redraw your sleeve cap curve from the underarm, up over the top, and down to the underarm again. 

After this, it's just a matter of going through our seven pattern-designing steps one by one until we're sure we've got the pattern we want.  Something we will, of course, do together.  Next time. 

Any questions?  Anything unclear?  Don't be afraid! Raise your hand and ask!

~Erin~

Here are our final design drawings:

 I think that, in order to get that pocket in there without interfering with the buttons, we'll just move the princess seam a little closer to the side seam, and have it come from the armhole instead of the shoulder.  Also, we'll place most of the buttons higher than the pocket.  We'll fiddle with this more as we make the coat up and get it right in the end. 

I think that we'll use our lining fabric to trim the sleeves, buttons, and capelet ruffle.  We could also use it for the pocket stand.  Or not.  What do you think?  Also, although we won't see it, we'll use the lining fabric to line the underside of the collar and the capelet. 

Now, if there are no further objections, we'll go to drafting our pattern tomorrow.

Objections?

~Erin~

We seem to like the simple coat with minimal flare, deep ruffle at the bottom, double breasted, straight sleeve with a ruffle, and round collar.

We seem to be divided, still, on the capelet.  No problem.  We'll do a capelet, but we'll make it completely detachable. 

I haven't been drawing the princess lines, because they'd be confusing when we're only trying to look at the shape of our coat.  But now we need to think about adding pockets.  We can either add pockets there in the princess seam, or we can add horizontal (or diagonal, I suppose) pockets right over the hips. 

 This drawing sort of gives us an idea of what contrast trim would look like.  We can use the gingham lining for any/all/none of the following:  collar, capelet ruffle, sleeve ruffles, buttons, pocket stands.  I have buttons to cover with the lining fabric, so I guess that at least those will have to be gingham.  I don't think we ought to make that deep ruffle in gingham.  That, I think, would be too much.  Everything else is up for grabs. 

As for the lining, I chose the cotton gingham for several reasons.  The fleece is a stretch fabric, and I suppose we have the option of lining it with a stretch or a woven fabric.  If I were concerned about keeping the stretch factor, I'd certainly line it with a nice soft knit.  I'm thinking, however, that we want our fleece to mimic sturdier fabrics, and lining it with a good strong cotton will help it to be a more upright citizen, so to speak.  Lining fabrics are usually whisper-thin because we don't want added bulk.  This time, I think, we'd like just a little. 

We do give up, however, the slippery quality of traditional linings that makes them slide on over clothes so nicely.  I think we can cut the sleeves a little more loosely and compensate somewhat. 

I also heard a couple of requests for inverted pleats, but I don't believe this chunky fleece would cooperate.  A tab in the back we may be able to do.

So, to move on, we'll need answers the the following issues:

-Where do we want our pockets?

-What parts of our coat, besides the lining and buttons, do we want to do in contrast/gingham?

Let me know what you think.  And have a lovely weekend, won't you?

~Erin~

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When I decide to design something, the very first thing I do is research.  When I have a finished product that looks unique because of my personal preferences, the fabric and trims I used, and design issues I solved in my own way, people often tell me that they wish they could come up with ideas like that.  They assume, I suppose, that I woke up from a dream with an image of the finished outfit blazing in my mind.  Or that when I designed it, I was in an empty cell, just me and a blank piece of paper, a bare light bulb hanging...

Maybe you're that good.  I'm not.

Before I can form an idea of what I want, I have to do research.  So I go to Google Image Search, or ShopStyle.com and I type in "coat".  Then "princess coat".  Then "double-breasted coat".  And so on.  (Typing "breasted" into any search engine is touchy.  That could go bad in a hurry.) 

I look through the tons of images quickly.  If I'm going to love something, it'll leap out at me immediately.  I save several images as I go along, until I have a good handful.  Then I open them all up in Photoshop at the same time, squint, tap my teeth with my fingernail, and the primordial ooze begins to evolve. 

All of that is to say, I would show you my design board, but since I've grabbed pictures from anywhere and everywhere, I can't just throw them up here, because they belong to other folks.  So we'll have to make do with my drawings (sorry, I know my creative talent lies elsewhere) and I'll show you what I found.  As we discuss this, please do go do your own searches and see some actual coats with the design features we're talking about. 

Now, when I think "really girly", I immediatly think ruffles.  I'm a sucker for ruffles.  After reading your comments over the last couple of days, I have several ideas kicking around in my head.   

I'm considering using this for the lining:

It's a 1/8" Kaufman cotton gingham in pink and brown from Fabric.com.

We can, of course, mix and match any of the parts from the coats I'm thinking up, or do something different entirely.  

 This coat has just a little flare, and a deep ruffle on the bottom.  The sleeve on the left is cuffed with the lining fabric, the one on the right is finished with a ruffle. 

This one is technically only "princess" to the waist, then a skirt is added below that.  It's also double-breasted, round-collared, and has the same choice of sleeves as above.  We can put a belt on it or not.  Is a belt a good idea on a children's coat?

This one has princess lines all the way down, but a lot more flare is added than the first coat up there.  It's single breasted, has ruffles on either side of the placket, and has a belt.  It also has two sleeves we haven't considered yet, a Juliet-type on the left, and a plain straight sleeve on the right.  We could also add more puff in the top of the sleeve for a different look.  Didn't think of that while I was drawing. 

As far as a capelet, if we decide we want one, we can add it to any of the styles above.  It might be better, if we do decide to do a capelet, to do a simpler style so fancy details aren't wasted hiding out under there. 

I don't believe that a capelet would actually make a child look as much like a football player as this drawing would have you believe.

Now we have some inspiration to chew on.  I only drew round collars because that's what we seemed to agree on. We can only make one coat this time around, so we need to narrow down our options.  We need to choose:

-a sleeve
-an amount of flare
-whether we want a belt
-whether we want a capelet

Those are my thoughts.  Yours?

~Erin~