soaker shorts, redux

We woke up dry this morning. Hooray! Since I know the basic system of two layers of fleece will work, I decided to tweak the pattern to better fit ds.

I decreased the width overall--the stride and each leg by about 2". I actually decided to only add a stride panel in the back, and I made it angled, so that it is wider over the bum than at the crotch. The fleece is cut so that it stretches width-wise for the front panel and legs, but length-wise for the back panel and inner layer. I increased the rise overall, but after sewing the panels together, I decreased the rise in front by about 2", so that the extra rise is only in back, where it is really needed. Instead of attaching the inner layer to the waistband (which ended up really, really bulky), I sewed it in with a zigzag in front and back, about 1" down from the top. Then, I used a lighter weight fleece to make a cuff/casing at the top, which I then put elastic into.

Here's a photo of the pieces, to give you an idea of what I did. I think that this basic setup works much better with the bulkier fleece than the original pattern did.



And the final product:



They fit a lot better!