It feels like October just started to me, this month was really fast!! I’ve been busy working on all kinds of things, including this new website. =D I also got to sew with some Rose Garden too!

Rose Garden is the newest fabric line by my friend Gerri Robinson. She also designs and sells beautiful quilt patterns in her shop Planted Seed Designs! <3 I really enjoyed getting to talk to her more at my last Quilt Market, she had a lot of insight! =)

I love the dusty muted colors in this fabric line. It goes great with the roses, really vintagey!

So in my head, I had this vision of my daughter during wintertime walking around with a little timeless wool coat, bonnet, and maybe a muff, and looking damn adorable. This girl would also magically be super sweet 100% of the time, wouldn’t whine at the tender age of 3, and be tantrum free?? ^_^; Okay, at least I could make the wool coat part happen. =D

I started looking around and didn’t really find a great pattern at first for the past year or so, but then I found this pattern: the Molly Jacket from Violette Field Threads. It’s a simple jacket, and surprisingly fast to sew. Sooo much faster than a fancy dress!!

I knew I wanted the outside to be wool, and I learned that Riley Blake sells wool….. ;) I thought that some of the Rose Garden fabric would pair really well with it in a jacket. I ended up choosing ‘Carnation’ pink for the wool, and one of the pink and grey rose prints for the lining.

After some research, I interlined the jacket with some fleece. I originally was thinking of interlining with some cotton batting, but I quickly learned that unless I quilted it with the lining fabric (I had already cut my lining fabric out) that the batting would pull apart and lump up uncomfortably inside the jacket. So that option was out.

There’s this massive group for pattern support for Violette Field Threads on Facebook, and those ladies are great at answering any questions you have about the pattern or what button to choose in the dress you’re making. ^__^ I asked my questions there, so glad I did, and learned that I should use flannel or fleece to interline things like jackets. One person reminded me to add a hidden button under the collar too, to help keep the tippy top of her jacket properly closed.

I ended up making fabric covered buttons to match. Using the bit of muscle I have (pushing the wool into that little mold thingy was kinda of hard mmkay?) I was happy to have made 4 buttons that actually turned out as…buttons.

Finally, to make the jacket a more complete look, it’d need a matching bonnet.

I used this this free bonnet pattern from Purl Soho, and I’ve made quite a few bonnets with this pattern! Making one is so fast and easy, it’s kinda addicting…!

This ‘Alexandra’ bow is another Violette Field Thread pattern. This grey fabric is also part of the Rose Garden collection. =)

Our new house only has pine trees on the property. Meaning, lots of pine needles in the lawn (as seen in the bottom picture) and we don’t have grass still (again, very visible in the below picture hah). So I took Lyla to my parent’s house to test out her new coat instead. Leaves and grass are way more fun to play in than dirt and pine needles. ;P

Plus Grandma just might feed you some warmed up eggnog with whipped cream on top!

Always,

Lauren