It took the winter of 2014/15 a little while to set it, but it’s here now. Boy, is it here. The temperature for much of yesterday was right around 0°, with wind chill temps in the minus-teens. Tomorrow the wind chill temp is supposed to drop to about -24°. One does not go outside without gloves, even just to take the bag of used kitty litter to the garbage can! (TMI? Sorry!)
At the Bernina/quilt store where I work worked until noon today, we’ve had two shelves of Shannon Cuddle just lingering on the shelves. Shoppers would come in and say how soft and lovely it was, but then move on to other fabrics. As I wrote yesterday regarding the Cuddle infinity scarf, there were bits of it going to new homes, but much of it is still on the shelf.
When I picked up the Winter issue of Stitch Magazine, and saw this cuddly lounging jacket made from Shannon Cuddle, I felt inspired. Taking advantage of the employee discount at the Bernina Store, I bought enough to make a jacket for my DIL-Equivalent and one for myself.
Here’s hers:
The reversible jacket requires about 2¾ yards of two colors of microfiber fleece. For Leslie, who lives in Amarillo and whose family has a long history of ranching and farming, one of the sides had to be “My Lil’ Buckaroo” in camel. For the outside, I chose Cuddle Embossed Vine in brown.
When I laid the pattern out to cut the fabric, I discovered an error in the pattern. I wrote to the designer and got a quick response, ensuring me that the error was the publisher’s, not hers, and that the publisher had agreed to fix it and reload the PDF pattern.
The pattern is marked “one size fits all,” but I beg to differ. Really, one size fits up to about a normal size 14, and that’s snug in the sleeves. On Leslie’s version, I had to take scant ½” seams and the sleeves still were probably too tight to wear a t-shirt under the jacket. On mine, I will try adding a bit to the shoulder seam and slash-and-spread the sleeve to give myself more room.
My only other complaint is the lack of a “sew here” button marking. I sewed those buttons on three times and still wasn’t happy with the placement and the way the jacket falls in the front. I doubt I will ever wear it out in public. This jacket—for me—is going to be something I wear in my drafty old (1927) house to stay warm in these brutal and long NE Ohio winters.
And how cute is this hood? Very! Now to finish one outstanding project downstairs so I can cut into the black classic and ivory vine Cuddle yardage that’s waiting for me in the sewing room.
Edited 1/12/2015
Note: I’ve exchanged several emails with designer Cheryl Bush regarding problems I had or errors I discovered with this pattern. Here are her comments:
The sizing should be marked S-L (One Size Fits Most between sizes 0-14).
To determine the best placement for the shoulder buttons, try jacket on at when completed. Smaller sizes should sew a button onto one side of the front, about 1 inch in front of the armscye, just under the hood seam. Larger sizes may prefer buttons to be 2 to 3 inches below the shoulder seam for a roomier fit. Do the same on the opposite shoulder, but this time on the inside lining.
If you find tacking the neck seam together after sewing the inside and outside together, you might sew the hood seam together from the outside as invisibly as possible for about an inch at the center back.
Cheryl noted “This is content that was included in the submission to Stitch Magazine, but omitted by the editor.”
Thank you, Cheryl! I’ll look forward to trying more of your patterns.
