Ever since I made the Betty Boop bathing suit I have been wanting to make a cover up, but it had to be the right cover up, preferably with a ’50s vibe. To my joy I found a pattern in Melbourne (I think I squeaked when I saw it!) that is from 1957 and is just the thing. It is a Vogue pattern – V9183 and is in  perfect condition.

I think my mother had this pattern! We have a photo of my elder sister in the playsuit (not looking quite as glam!), and what about that hat?! Moan… I want that hat!

Anyway, I had plenty of the red polka dot fabric left, so knew I could make the coat. It is supposed to be lined with terry towelling, but I thought this might make it too heavy, (and the fabric is pretty heavy already) so used two pieces of white t-shirt remnants from my stash. I have to say that this was not a fun garment to make. It slid about, there was a lot of fabric to manage, and the lining moved about separately, but it worked out ok in the end.

and yes, it has pockets!

Please note the perfect sized buttons sitting on the polka dots. I was pretty happy with myself. I had to slightly adjust the position of the buttons – they are supposed to start right at the neckline, whereas I closed the neck with a clear plastic press stud. This works well and doesn’t show when the coat is left open. The buttons are shell and I bought them at Knitwit.

I made sure I copied all the pattern elements so that I can reuse it without worrying about degrading the original pattern.

One exciting thing that has come from my Betty Boop bathing suit is the fact I (and the Betty Boop) have been included in a blog “Sew Mama Sew” – Sewing Trends with Rachael. You cannot believe how chuffed I am. There are some seriously lovely renditions of this pattern on the Flickr group, but I suspect that Rachael wanted someone of the original vintage! She denied this of course…:)

I wasn’t the only one being creative this weekend; Mark, as usual, spent his weekend cooking and he made these chocolate puddings. He presented me with one at lunch with the exhortation to only eat half! Half?! Was he kidding?!

This is a Nigella Lawson recipe and I can and must recommend it – it is divine. I did manage to confine myself to half, although I probably snuck a teeeeny bit of his half!

GCC:

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