It's raining coats.

If I could call last year anything, I'd call it the year of the coat. I made a lot of them - it was only natural then that I'd put all that expertise into my two finales - helping my sister make a coat for herself, and the "Jonah Coat" for myself, the crazy difficult BWOF 11-2008-107.

Here's my sister's coat. (Butterick 5295) Didn't she do well? Helping someone create a nice coat? Satisfying. Being able to boss about my older sister? Priceless.





The Jonah coat was the hardest thing, by a long long shot, that I have ever sewn. It would have been fine if my figure was closer to the norm: but with multiple adjustments I could barely keep track of what I had added to where - it became very hard to figure out.

I'm not the only one having a tanty:



It is never my intention to wear this coat done up, but I put on the domes and buckles just in case.



The lining - a beautiful sage green acetate (Bemberg) from Nicks.



Because I made a side panel bust adjustment, a front panel bust adjustment, a waist and hip adjustment, a narrow shoulder adjustment, a full bicep adjustment, a low bust apex adjustment, a sloping shoulder adjustment, a forward shoulder adjustment and an arm length adjustment. Most of those adjustments where "slash and spread" adjustments, and not a matter of adding to or taking out of side seams.

I have a new definition of envy: it's someone who says, "I sewed a standard 40 grading out a little from bust to waist."

For all its crazy look and fitting nightmares I really feel good wearing this coat. I'll feel even better wearing it when it's winter instead of high summer and when I've forgotten a little bit about how hard it was to make.

Yes, in another 5 months it'll be perfect.

Costings: Fabric, Sally Army, wool gabardine, $5, lining, Acetate (bemberg) Nick's $5, domes, thread, inside buttons, petersham ribbon and buckles, tailor's shoulder pads $22, interfacing $10 = $42