This is Ace. Being the youngest kid, he ends up wearing a lot of hand-me-downs and gets fewer brand-new clothes than the other kids. When I do make him things, I like to make sure he gets unique things. Last year, he got his bat-suit, and he still wears it quite often. Since he’s in Kinder now, though, he can’t wear a bat-suit every day. He’s been asking and asking for me to make him the bat hoodie from Ottobre 1/2013, and I finally did.
What makes his hoodie a bat hoodie? Wings, of course.
The main body is cotton sweatshirt fleece. The hood lining and cape inserts are cotton/lycra jersey. The cuffs are from one piece of ribbing and the waistband is from another piece. Amazingly, despite all the different fabrics used, it manages to look fairly cohesive, though obviously not all the same–such is the benefit of working with black fabric.
It has all the usual features for a kid’s hoodie. Zipper front, 2 pockets, a waistband, ribbed cuffs, and a lined hood.
Also, it has ears.
The cape effect comes from “embroidery” on the back. I say embroidery, but it’s just top-stitching or zig-zag stitching along guidelines on the pattern. I used a slightly shiny rayon embroidery thread in a light grey color so it stands out a bit more than if it were just contrasting color thread.
The cape continues between the side seams and the sleeve seams with wedge-shaped pieces of jersey.
The original pattern had some hardware details that I omitted. The features he really wanted were the ears and wings, and I wasn’t sure the hardware really added anything to the design. Simple is good.
As I was thinking about writing up this post, it occurred to me that superhero’s moms are not often treated well in their worlds. I don’t have an extensive knowledge of comic books/superheros, but of the most common story-lines or mainstream hero movies, it seems that killing off the mom/birth mom is an essential part of the plot. Yikes! Dads don’t seem to fare much better. Often they also get killed off, so the hero can become the hero he was meant to be. If the dad gets to stick around, it’s most likely that kid is going to grow up to be the villain, not the hero. If the guy wearing the cape still has his mom in his life, the odds are that he’s just another guy at the geekery convention (and he might live in his mom’s basement). Geekery is good. Capes for all!
Back to the pattern. I love how this turned out. It’s a subtle look, at least for a Kinder-aged boy, but it’s special too. It’s practical as well. My kids always seem to have a use for another hoodie in their closets. I imagine I might be making this one again, since there are still a few sizes left before Ace will outgrow the pattern.
Of course, Ace’s favorite part of this hoodie is the cape. When we were getting pictures, most of them were like this because, capes = flying.
Stash-busting stats: 6 projects this year. 8 yards of fabric used.
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