Sweatshirt jacket-- Cut it up and cover the pieces

    I thought I would have the jacket done by now....but chipped/cracked tooth interfered.  After visits to the dentist and oral surgeon, hopefully I will get it fixed and saved on Tuesday.  So my stitching has been in spurts this week and  I only have the front sections and sleeves covered. 
  I am using a polar fleece for the foundation, but it is done just like covering a cut up sweatshirt. 

    The front sections are very straight forward.....just block to block construction to create a piece of  big enough to cover the jacket front.  That is 2 sections, left and right sides.  Once I pinned it to the fleece, I then trimmed it around the neck and armhole areas, leaving about an inch extra.   My next step for these sections is to do part of the quilting to anchor the fabric to the fleece.  I plan on adding some applique across one shoulder to the back and one sleeve, so that area will not be quilted for now.   

    The sleeves are a little different to cover  because of shape and length.  A lot of the area of the sleeve will not be seen as it is on the under arm side.  Basically, the part that is seen is through the center of the sleeve--top to bottom.  So take that into consideration, if you are wanting to feature a pieced or applique block on a sleeve area.  Second, is the sleeve length.....I have short arms and my sleeve only needed 2  and 1/2 blocks to cover the length.  This affected the layout.  I could either cut a block in half or use whole blocks and add fill strips. 
   Here's what I did to one sleeve.  Two blocks across the widest top area...these are medium to light blocks that will blend with the front and back sections.  One block centered to the bottom of the sleeve and this one
is a darker one. 

Now to fill in the blank spots........At the bottom I decided to go ahead and cut one block in half and place it on either side of the centered block.  I like how it blended here, rather than 2 blocks side by side.  No real reason--just me.    Pieced strips will fill in the remaining blank areas between the blocks and at the bottom. 

Short strips will be added to the upper sleeve to finish covering the fleece.  Then the entire piece will be trimmed a bit to shape. 

You have to kind of think in 3-D when covering the different sections....by that I mean, remember that the front shoulder attaches to the sleeve and back.  So keep the  fabric value close to what it will attach to for a blended look.  The same is true at the side seams for the front and back. 
    So, I've got another sleeve  and back to figure out and then create the applique I want.  Here's to a great weekend.  Happy stitching.