Dear Yourstylerocks
I found your site on a 'stumbleon' and saw the Everywhere Tails pattern and knew I had to make it.
Pix are at http://www1.snapfish.com/snapfish/thumbn..
This was a challenging pattern to make, which may reflect my level of expertise. I would not recommend it to a beginner as you definitely need to know how clothes go together. Having said that, it is a very nicely drafted pattern. Some of the issues I had relate to the instructions - I couldn't work the collar instructions to look nice, but just handstitched in the back collar over the front edges and it worked great - the collar falls perfectly. The instructions tell you to sew the collar pieces together at mid back AFTER you attach to the collar stand, rather than before. Some of the notches on the fronts are wrong (but are ok on the facing) which made it a little challenging (but fun).
I used a high quality very pretty dark green polyester brocade from my stash (looks like silk, had me fooled until I did a burn test), which is heavier than the suggested fabrics. This may be why I had some problems draping the front, and it still needs some tweaking. The lining is silk from an old sari. I did not use a bias strip for the back neck lining as I did not have enough fabric but used a double strip of a thin black lycra knit that have used for binding before. This worked perfectly and made a nice flat binding.
I used 2 rather than 3 buttons and made small buttonholes just to sink the shanks into (so the buttons didn't dangle) that were then covered up by 2 giant snaps inside. Worked great.
The skirt is a basic left slit pattern that I altered to add a double ended zip. It is a dark grey denim lined in dark green and I bound the zip facings in the brocade from the top. The double ended zip means that you can make the zip as high as you dare!
I think that it has made a pretty cool evening outfit and I can't wait to wear it out after a tad more tweaking of the front fold that I can't get to hang right (keep turning front edge under).