Pea Coat Progress + New Patterns!

Readers, be honest: do you think this McCall's pattern I just purchased, which dates from approximately 1957, is too Sixteen Going on Seventeen for my cousin Cathy?

Perhaps you are wondering how old Cathy is, anyway.  I believe a woman is only as old as she looks, which means Cathy is a still-dewy 28.  Who just guffawed!?



I also picked up this Vogue men's pattern:



So why do I still purchase so many patterns when many of them would be easy enough to draft (especially the men's patterns)?   Friends, I like patterns.  No, I love patterns.  Even if I could draft the exact same thing myself, I love the artwork and the sense of connecting with the history of home sewing, do you know what I mean?

In pea coat news, today was all about my two front double welt pockets.

First I sketched each pocket on the wrong side of each front with colored pencil.  (A dart goes through them so one side had to be retraced a bit.)



Next, I stitched around the entire rectangle from the wrong side, with easy-to-see thread in my bobbin.



I interfaced the whole area -- probably unnecessary, but it couldn't hurt -- with a strip of fusible interfacing.



The rectangle is 1" wide, so each exposed welt has to be 1/2" wide when turned under.  I cut 2" pieces for my welts, folded them in half (so they were now 1" wide) and stitched the edges closed at 1/4."   Then, using my straight stitch foot, I attached them by stitching over the visible blue stitch line at 1/4" from the 1/4" stitch line on the welt (leaving the 1/2" for each exposed welt).  Does that make sense?



On top of the lower welt, I attached the side of the pocket that will come in contact with the wrong side of the coat (and will be turned under along with the welts).



Then I cut open the rectangle and turned the welts and pocket through the cut; I'm sure most of you know the routine.  After that, any blue thread that was visible got pulled out.



Next I added the other side of the pocket, the one that has the facing, by attaching it to the other turned-under welt (the two pocket layers are still not attached to each other).



Then I carefully topstitched around the whole pocket, being careful that I didn't stitch the entire pocket closed while I topstitched, and also added an additional frame of decorative topstitching (as per the pattern).   Tomorrow I will stitch the two sides of the pocket together.

The pockets could still use a light pressing, but currently they look like this:





And that was my sewing day!

Tomorrow I hope to attach the back to the fronts, as well as the undercollar.  If there's time, I might cut my lining; we'll see.

Have a great day, everybody!