Keeping my Buddy Warm

Meet Buddy. He does not like to be cold. The blanket he is covered in was on the back of the couch but he pulled it onto himself. He always likes to be under the covers unless it is extremely hot outside. It is very difficult to get him to go out when it is cold outside. Being the crafty aunt that I am, I decided it was time for my Budman to have a nice cozy jacket.

Trekking to Joann Fabric, I found McCall 4684 and purchased some nice warm fleece that was on sale for $2 a yard, extra wide binding tape and some velcro to whip up a dog jacket in an afternoon.

After about 3 hours of cutting, ironing and sewing, Buddy was the proud owner of a new jacket. We weren't sure if he would like it as he as been generally averse to any kind of doggie clothing but, given its blanket-like nature, he was quite pleased with the result and did not like having it taken off for modifications.

I will warn anyone thinking about making this pattern that you will have to heavily modify it to fit your dog. Although I measured Buddy and determined him to be a medium, it was extremely large in certain areas (too long, the straps hung below his waste) and too small in others (everytime he moves, the neck velcro comes undone.) If you are going to make this jacket, either do it in cheap fleece to try it or do a muslin before investing in more expensive fabric. I also would recommend skipping the binding and sewing the lining and outer garment together wrong sides together and turning it right side out to finish. Two layers of polar fleece combined with the binding tape were extremely difficult to sew and the binding did not add much to the garment.