A word about progress - Marji

Marji, do you think you could dash off a post that offers words of encouragement to us novices out there? Speaking for myself, I am feeling a little overwhelmed. Some of this stuff just feels so advanced. It's not that the instructions aren't clear or that I don't understand what to do.... It just feels like I've never sewn anything of this magnitude before and I'm concerned I'm going to make some fatal error. For example, I don't usually have a fear of cutting fabric, but I keep putting off cutting out my coat.

This is an excerpt from an email I just received.

So I'm wanting to conduct an informal survey -

• where are you in your coat construction?
  
• Are you stuck? Do you feel ready to move along?

The muslin fitting stage extended beyond where I intended (my fault entirely for not keeping up with the timeline), and I think we lost some momentum.
I know several here have continued on and we've been treated to pictures of their progress.
Thank you to Gry, Kay and Jenny. Your coats are coming along fabulously. I appreciate the pictures and progress reports you've put up.

If you've finished your muslin but are reluctant to move ahead I'd like to offer these words of encouragement:
If you take it all step by step, and just do the next one, it'll all come together and soon you'll find it's just about done. Most of you are working with wool, and wool is wonderful to work with - and Very forgiving.
If your muslin fits or mostly fits and you're happy with it, then get it laid out and post a picture if you want someone else to check it before you cut.
As far as the underlining or interlining goes - which is the following step, just allot time. It's time consuming to lay the underlining over the fabric, hand stitch it together, and then thread trace all your lines. Not hard, just time consuming.
I put on an audible book and just have at it. Fortunately, I have a table that is the right height.
Break up the session by sitting down in between pieces to make some buttonhole samples.

My own progress
I've decided, working on my burgundy wool/cashmere jacket, that bound buttonholes are not appropriate for this quasi-military style jacket that has epaulets/belt/sleeve tabs and is double breasted. So I was able to move right on to the interfacing for the front. My buttonholes will be made at the end of construction.

Because I'm not confident of my ability to get wonderfully perfect straight lines doing my padstitching, since I don't do it every week, I draw lines in pencil on my hair canvas. This is commonly accepted practice.
My pattern didn't have a roll line.
I neglected to mark it before (remember my admonition to mark the roll line before taking your muslin apart? That's because I didn't! So I chose to draw the roll line from the large dot.
Last night, while watching Project Runway I got the first lapel padstitched. Then I draped it on my front, with the collar piece, holding all together, and realized that I should have chosen the straight mark as opposed to the round one. So, I added 3 lines. If you click on the picture to make it larger you'll see the merge of the two angles. I could have been really AR and taken it all apart, but I didn't. It's fabric. It'll roll.

Remember the dart that I cut out when I made the pattern? To stitch it I just butted the lines together and made a multiple stitch zigzag. Acceptable practice is to also butt the edges together and stitch over a piece of seam binding/hem tape.


If you've been hesitant to get started, in the words a certain athletic wear manuf: Just Do It!
If you have questions or concerns, just come on back in here and ask.