Jump Rope Dress

Ahh, finally done!

I am embarrassed at how much I dragged my feet on this project. Even when I had time to sew, I found excuses to not work on it . While sewing on 7 buttons and hand-stitching the inside collar, I looked at this mass of what suddenly looked like prairie-homeschool-corduroy on my lap and thought, "this dress is awful, I might hate it, and I am going to have to chalk up all this work to a learning experience."

However, as I neared the finish line, it began to seem kind of cute-ish. When I put it on DD (who was thrilled, BTW), it looked even cuter. Like the classic shirtdress it is supposed to be, it was perfectly age appropriate and timeless on my 5 year old girl. Whew.

Fabric:

Cotton corduroy from Joanns. I have been pretty happy with all the cord I've purchased there. It is slightly thinner than what you might get from, say, Robert Kaufman or Michael Miller, but that suits our milder weather. This particular cut has been sitting in my stash for nigh on 2 years.

Pattern:

Oliver & S Jump Rope Dress. Comparing O & S's pattern catalog against my 4 years worth of Ottobre backlist issues, I tend to have similar ones already on hand, so it is hard to justify purchasing one. Don't get me wrong, I really like a lot of the their patterns; it just doesn't make sense for me personally to collect them. But, this is the only non-Big 4 shirt dress pattern I have been able to find in my daughter's size, and I have heard so many good things about O & S that I wanted to try one of their designs.

Well, this is a completely awesome pattern. So well drafted, such good instructions. Even with high expectations, I am very impressed. This one was a labeled a 3 scissor pattern (out of 4), and I think that's about accurate. I usually use quicker, ready-to-wear techniques to construct my garments, but for this one I wanted to go old-fashioned and did everything exactly like the instructions said. Pressed open seams and all. Several of the style features were out of my comfort zone, and I'm so happy to have challenged myself:

-Button placket - You see these on the sleeves of men's shirts--it's a faced opening that is not on a seam, but rather opens up in the middle of the fabric. On this dress it's on the center front of the bodice.

-Collar

-Cuffed sleeves with a button tab that comes up over the cuff

-Gathering the old-fashioned way -- Make two lines of long stitches, then pull up on the threads to gather the fabric. I usually use my serger to gather, but in the spirit of slow old school, I forewent the serger this time.

I think the length is perfect for now, with a enough growing length to last us into next Fall.

I had this Latte With Linky bracelet for me, but I thought it went so perfectly with this dress, so I put it on DD. She LOVES it.

The pockets have a faux flap on the front, so when you sew the button on, you also sew the flap to the front of the pocket.

Unfortunately not matter how much I told her that, DD insisted that there was another pocket opening underneath that flap. Of course, she came home from school with a missing button. Denying that she had tried to dig underneath the flap for the fabled second pocket and popped off the button. Sigh.

I thought the sash tied in a bow looked all Happy Hands at Home, so I did a knot instead. Under much protest from the wearer. "But I want a pretty booooooow...!!"

Mostly everything on this dress is top stitched, but it sort of melts right into the corduroy. BTW, I am a poor photographer, but my camera really hated this fabric. I wish the details had come out a little clearer. The silver lining is that, even in person, any top stitching mistakes are basically impossible to see.

These button tabs are faux, as well. Hopefully she doesn't try to unbutton the cuffs, because then we'll have more missing buttons.

Classic expression for her. Just. Thinking so hard about some hare-brained idea. Such as, "Mommy, I have a great idea! I'm having a party tomorrow, so let's send out invitations. Here, I'll address them."

(You can guess what the addresses look like. Then when I try for the umpteenth time to explain that this is not how the world works: 1 day notice parties, lumpy envelopes with play-doh creations inside, markered addresses like "Prncus Avlin, hr has", the waterworks come...sigh. Then, more of these expressions.)

Lots of stuff to come.