Faux Fur Vest

Pretty much every Saturday I go thrift store shopping.  Today it dawned on me that I hadn't been to the Value Village on 85th in a while.  As soon as I walked in the door, I remembered why: I hate this Value Village. It's always really crowded, the "nick knack" shelves are ridiculous and unorganized, they hang their jeans all weird by the thigh, and there are tons of unattended children wandering the aisles wreaking havoc on those of us who have chosen to not burden the world with our annoying spawn.  As I wandered around I kept running into sweater vests...tons of them.  Then I remembered a photo I had seen in a magazine of a woman wearing a knitted sweater with a fur collar.  So, I bought a mens' sweater vest, and a McCalls  pattern for a hideous cardigan and came up with this:

You will need:
Sweater vest
pattern that has a collar
faux fur
sewing machine
polyblend lining

I bought my fur at JoAnns.  Another bad choice.  It was 5:54 and the stupid pay to park was still in effect.  I looked around, thinking that there would be no parking meter reader in downtown Ballard on a Saturday.  Wrong, ma'am.  There the little asshole was in his go-cart hybrid thing that they run around on.  I only had a quarter, so I grossly over paid for my 6 minutes of parking, and carried on.  I entered JoAnn's, which apparently was having an old ladies with walkers convention.  They were EVERYWHERE.  I waded my way through their horrible floral scented perfume and made it tot he faux fur area.  after carefully selecting the cheapest fur available I made my way to the cutting counter.  I am number 85.  they are on number 83.  Great, not that long.  Just kidding.  Number 84 is no where to be found.  This is what I get to listen to for the next five minutes "Now helping guest number 84 at the cutting counter."  Nothing.  Wait one minute "Second call for number 84 at the cutting counter." Wait another few minutes...the little asshole behind the counter just smiles.  Dude, the store isn't that big, they aren't here! "Last call for number 84"  Nothing.  Then he starts organizing remnants.  "Well I guess they aren't coming, guest 85?" Dear lord, who gave you a job?! Then the best part "Oh, this is beutiful fabric!" Are you kidding? It is matted fake fur. Get out of my face.  I digress.


First, Cut the sweater vest down the middle.  Also cut out the pattern pieces that you will be using.

Now, fold the fur in half, and cut the collar out.  Make sure that you are cutting through two layers of fur, and that you DO NOT cut the fold open.

Now, cut a piece of polyblend lining out.  This is going to make it so little annoying ass chunks of fur don't start to fall off of your collar.  At this point, my jeans were covered in fur and it looked like Iris the Cat had snuck into my apartment and coughed up a ton of hair balls.

Sew the lining to the right side of the fur (you are going to flip it inside out, so pretend that you are making a little furry pillow, so leave a little two inch section in order to flip.

Make sure to trim really well around the edges before flipping it right side out, or else it's going to be all chunky and gross.

Now, hand sew the little opening shut.  Pin this U shaped tail to your vest and sew it on.  Make sure to follow the seam where the lining meets the fur, or else it looks like a disgusting fur cornrow along the edge.

Last step: Sew the cut edge by folding it to the inside of your vest and running a 1/4" seam.  Get out a lint roller and cleanup all the spare fur.  And look! Your very own Forever 21 style fur vest!