Toddler Hoodie Jacket

Click this picture to find the pattern!

I found a free pattern for a toddler hoodie with a lovely video tutorial.

Pattern cut, instructions printed, and JoAnn Fabrics scrap section raided.
I'm ready to go!

This toddler jacket pattern is adorable and perfect as is, but of course I had to make it much more difficult by changing things up a bit. First I decided that a single layer of fleece for the jacket would be far too breezy.

Ripstop nylon from ebay (used for kite making).
No wind is getting through this jacket.

I altered the pattern to fit my little girl, age 13 months at the time of sewing, since the pattern is 3T-ish (more on how I screwed that up later!). I also printed the pattern on regular printer paper because I'm that magic combination of cheap and lazy that means getting the proper A4 paper was never going to happen. Then I decided to add elastic to the wrists and a row of plastic snaps overlapping the zipper to block even more windy breezes.

I love my snap tool! Maybe I'll write up a review on it at some point. In retrospect I really should have added some interfacing under the snaps on either side. I have to be a little careful when opening them as they want to stretch the fleece. I also initially bought a regular zipper. *doh* Jackets require a separating zipper Lynda. Should have been obvious, but I'm remarkably dense sometimes.

As you can sort of see already in these pictures of my very happy little girl (she loved the jacket) that I made the jacket too small. Boo hiss. My mistake was I fit it to her. When I shop for clothes I always buy a size up to get the most wear out of something before the kids outgrow it. So why, oh why, would I make a jacket that actually fits??!?!? Seriously, I just don't know about me sometimes.

To make matters worse I measured her about a month or two before I actually finished the jacket. This project required a lot of me staring at the unsewn pieces and trying to mentally pick them up, sew, and turn them to see what order things needed to happen in. So, even though I had made it a bit roomy for the measurements I took, she had grown enough in the intervening months that it was snug.

Now, a little over a month since these pictures were taken, it's time to hand it over to the consignment shop. I could keep it for theoretical future children or grandchildren but this house lacks in storage space and the jacket's not quite heirloom material. I knew she would only be wearing it for one season at the most anyway, but she wore this about three times total.

On the bright side, lessons learned, cute jacket completed (and possibly turned into moneys), and I had something to put on my blog. Not too shabby.