Oh! What Fun it is to Ride…

Oh!  What a nervous wreck I am!  

Thank you so, so much for popping over to see more of my Winter Wonderland look for Project Run & Play!  I have so thoroughly enjoyed creating this look, but man! am I full of jitters now that the big day is finally here!

I’ll begin at the top and work my way down.  I used my own Camper Hat pattern to create the pony ear hat, but modified it by lengthening the crown, omitting the floppy brim and replacing it with a cap brim similar to that on a riding helmet, and adding the pony ears.  I had the fabrics in my stash from two prior pattern tests – See Kate Sew’s Bubblegum Coat, and Very Shannon’s Sally Dress.  The secret to the brim is to use one of those flexible kitchen cutting mats to make it rigid!  

I’m thinking a whole menagerie of animal ears would be cute on this hat, don’t you?  The scarf is a simple rectangle of printed chiffon sewn in a tube to serve as the ascot in her riding outfit.

The coat is based off See Kate Sew’s Bubblegum Coat since I had tested that and knew the fit through the shoulders was good.  I changed it up to become a double-breasted coat and carried the same pink bouclé fabric from the hat onto the rounded collar and the elbow patches.  The grey fabric is upholstery fabric from the red tag bin at my local Jo-Ann.  I grabbed a single breasted coat of  mine to figure out the geometry of how the collar fit into the lapels.  I’m happy to say that it worked out on my first try and lay perfectly smooth!  I used facings around the hem, as I could not simply turn up the hem of the coat with the curved hemline.  It’s lined with a stretch polyester charmeuse, which involved some hand stitching to finish.  The buttons are from my button jar including a smaller matching button on the inside to keep everything aligned and closed nicely.  That’s called a jigger as I learned from Wikipedia while researching this style of coat to be sure I was getting it right.

The riding pants – sorry about the rear view, but that’s where all the fun is, amiright?  These began as Blank Slate Patterns Clean Slate Pants (affiliate link) but made much skinnier by using the 5T length and 3T width as well as larger seam allowances.  I also nipped the back seam in a little and used buttonhole elastic so they would stay up on her little waist.  Droopy pants are a plague around here, but not with these!  I drafted in the curved pieces for the saddle grip panel which are on both the front and back pieces.  I love the look these give her little backside!  

There’s double needle stitching all around the stretch damask denim as well as the inseam and zip fly.  More of the pink makes an appearance on the pockets of these pants and they’re all lined with the same pink polka dot charmeuse as the coat lining.  For the zippered welt pocket I made use of a bright pink zipper for a slash of pink on the back.

I won’t deny that having a cousin with a pony nearby factored into my planning for this look!  Arden has been infatuated with Sweet Pea ever since she first rode on her as an 18 month old during one of our family picnics at my Uncle’s farm.  I’ll ask what her favorite animal is and without fail her answer is “Sweet Pea”.  Thanks Angel, for being on board with our pony-inspired outfit and for trekking around in the cold for us!

I love this picture of Arden on Sweet Pea!  She really is a sweet pony – I wish I could ride her!  She has a pony cart so she can be driven and give more passengers a ride.  Angel gives horsemanship lessons and Sweet Pea showed with one of her pint-sized students in local fairs this summer.

It has been such a dream for me to participate as a designer in Project Run & Play.  Me, a designer?  Feels a little funny, but I’ll happily wear that hat!  I love, love the entire process: brainstorming ideas, pinning inspiration images to my (shh! secret!) Pinterest board, sketching out ideas, deciding on fabrics, drafting and sewing my final looks, and the photo shoots!