A Well-Dressed Packer Fan

My sister, Alfred, is a huge Packer fan.  On every single game day, she decks herself out in green and gold, with her cheesehead earrings, Packers sock, a Packers top and Packers bottoms.
Unfortunately, her Packers bottoms, as seen here, resemble pajama bottoms.  With most Packer games being on Sundays, that means Alfred, much to the chagrin of her fashion-diva sister, often wears these knit pants to church.

Sewing machine to the rescue!  (And a very patient mommy/seamstress phone consultant.)
Now Alfred has a nice outfit for game days.  She described it as “the coolest Packer dressy outfit ever!”  I am very happy.



A green velvet circle skirt with matching jacket.  Instead of a poodle, like the traditional circle skirt, it has cheese! 

Hooray for giant sequins.
I made the skirt a size bigger than Alfred’s normal size on purpose.  Circle skirts are designed to go on your natural waistline, and Alfred hates things at her waist.  She said it feels slightly loose, but that could just be the weight.  (It’s 3.5 lbs!)  She danced around a bit in it and it didn’t fall off.  Plus, she knows how to sew too, so she can move the hook and eye if need be.

The only slightly bad part was hemming the skirt.  It took 3 days.  I actually ran out of the pretty gold lace hem tape and had to go back to the store to get a third pack.  The skirt is 7 yds around!  The Legend commented, ‘make it slightly bigger and she could mark 1st downs.’
The jacket is reversible.  On one side, it’s the regular green velvet, like the skirt.  On the other, green satin with her favorite player’s number.  This was a bit tricky.  The pattern was for an unlined jacket with facing.  Plhhh.  How boring.  With plenty of virtual assistance from Mommy, I managed to create a reversible version without two much trouble.  Somehow, I managed to get most of it stitched together inside out, leaving only a small place at the bottom for turning that had to be stitched up by hand.

I also lengthened the jacket because the pattern was designed to go with a skirt on the waist, not on the hips.  If I didn’t lengthen it, it would stop at an awkward place above the top of the skirt.  I think it came out a good length. Alfred seemed to think it was ok, too.

Originally, Mommy and I were thinking this would make a good Christmas gift for Alfred.  Then, we thought maybe she’d wnt to wear it on Christmas.  No Packer game that day, but it’s still a pretty outfit.  But then, we realized the Packers play on Thanksgiving.  What a perfect day for a nice new Packer outfit!  She got it in the mail today. :)
I’m so happy she likes it.  I was worried it wouldn’t fit at all, or that she wouldn’t like something about it.  I hope she sends picture of her wearing it.  Maybe some with her and PackerSpockMonkey hint, hint…