More and more stripes

I've little to report, LuLu, only that the coat is growing, stripe by stripe. And we're picking up a bit of speed here as the two pieces (right-front and left-back) grow narrower. That's a benefit you won't be able to experience, sadly, until you've finished the sleeves and are flying down the front. Have you considered stopping at the shoulder-line? You could certainly justify it because the coat will be so heavy, it could well use the stablizing strength of a 3-needle seam at the shoulder.I'm down from 88 stitches on each piece to 65. And I'm feeling more and more anguish over the need to eliminate those 22 rows. Is it better to skip entire stripes, or make the stripes narrower? it seems to me that the coat will be more flattering if the stripes (generally) are wider at the bottom but become narrower up toward the yoke (and my body's mid-section, ahem). That's why I stuck with the full width, per the pattern, of the grapey section at the bottom of the coat. But I may have to go back and sacrifice some of that if I can't be more disciplined (feels draconian) about eliminating rows to make the coat short enough.