More About Making Greyhound Coats

As many of you know, I have an ongoing volunteer activity of making fleece coats for re-homed greyhounds. When there are gaps in my writing of a few days, it’s often because I’m busy sewing and I’m really not motivated to try to write a new and exciting post about the process.

For this pose, I’d just like to share how I go about choosing fabrics and how I sew four coats at a time, like an assembly line.

You can read more about my work with the greyhounds over the last two years at the following posts:

https://marykisner.com/greyhounds-in-my-heart/

https://marykisner.com/cozy-coats-for-greyhounds/

https://marykisner.com/ongoing-work-with-greyhound-coats/

https://marykisner.com/time-to-get-back-to-making-greyhound-coats/

First of all, I am making coats for an unknown dog. I make two sizes…large or small. The main difference is the size of the neck area. The dogs arrive at Nittany Greyhounds (https://nittanygreys.org/) in Port Matilda, outside State College. They come from several locations. Some come from one of the few remaining tracks in the USA. Others come from Ireland or Australia. Their challenging travels will be described in another post.

While, in general, the male dogs are “large” and the female dogs are “small”, that’s not always the case so I try to keep my choices of colors neutral. I like using plaids or snowflakes. Any color I choose, I will be making 2 large and 2 small coats. In this latest batch the request was for more small/female coats, so with the bright pink fabric below I cut all four coats the small size.

When I step into JoAnn’s I’m faced with a wide variety of choices:

My most recent trip I ended up with 5 colors, with solid colors for the lining. I agreed to make all the pink ones small since Nittany had a number of females that needed coats. The rest of the colors would make 2 large and 2 small coats by folding the fabric off center to accommodate the wider width of the large coats.

Here were my color choices:

Cutting Out the Coats

I cut four coats of the same color at the same time. After I cut out the linings, I stack the pieces up so I don’t accidently sew a small snood (the neck piece) onto a large coat!

I first sew all the straps, attach my email tag and sew the Velcro (hook) piece to the end.

Then I sew the body of the coat, attach the snood and sew on the strap and Velcro loop piece. I’m always amazed how different colors look in different light! Below is the same coat!

I took this coat out to Nittany Greyhounds to try it on a small dog. Here’s an example of a small male whose owner might prefer the coat NOT be pink! But he served my purpose to show the coat on a dog!

Over the years, I have modified the pattern to accommodate how the greyhounds function in the coats. The coat fits snug around the chest area and running doesn’t seem to dislodge the coat. The snood, the strap and darts at the back end work together to keep the coat straight. Often, in winter, the dogs wear their coats indoors so the coats needed to stretch as they curled up. Originally, I tried using non-stretch sweatshirt fabric and this was the result… looks really uncomfortable.

So, back to stretchy fleece…curling up looks really cozy now!

I realize owners can find interesting coats online that could serve as “costumes” but since there are many cute choices online, I’ll spend my time making functional, warm coats. You won’t see a coat like this from my sewing machine!

Here are two hounds ready to go out for a walk!

Next time you wonder why I haven’t posted for a few days, consider how soon a greyhound will be cozy!