We celebrated the boys’ birthday last weekend (and no, you won’t be seeing picture after picture of an immaculately planned, exquisitely executed party complete with matching themed everything on this blog.  I make a homemade chocolate cake.  I iced it.  It sort of looked like a lego block.  Sort of.  Regardless, the children ate it/smeared it/devoured it and I am comfortable with that level of motherly love.  Live with it :))

The reason I am telling you this is not to announce my ceding of the crown to Martha “it’s a good thing” Stewart but to say that my niece and SIL came down to celebrate with us, which gave me a chance to whip up a quick outfit for Ellie.  I’m quite busy at work and sewing gives me a chance to relax.  All the same, I wanted something fast, so I chose this cute jumper from a 2005 issue of Ottobre (the same issue that her raincoat came from, actually).

I know it looks like an infant’s garment but it went up to a size 3 (98cm) so it worked perfectly for E.  I picked up the fabric – a vibrant cat print – from Len’s Mill.  My niece has a thing for our cat, Puss.  Or as she calls her, “Puss-eee”.  The fabric was an end, bright enough that she’ll still be able to wear it in the spring with a t-shirt but dark enough that it’s appropriate for winter wear, too.  It’s a very, very light twill.

All of the buttons, studs and the clasps are stash, from a jean making frenzy I entertained (briefly) when David was about five.

In fact, I wouldn’t have minded it having a little more weight to the fabric, given the weight of the findings but interfacing the yoke took care of the problem well enough that I was satisfied.

I top stitched with machine quilting thread.  It could have stood to be a little thicker, too since the fabric was so busy but I was stash diving and I wasn’t going out for more thread.  I also toyed with adding some machine embroidery to the front yoke or pocket but I was going for “quick and easy” here.  It’s too easy to get sucked into adding one more thing each and every time.   Like Odysseus, I resisted.

There are some very nice details to the pattern(it’s Ottobre – that’s no suprise) for such a quick project.   The front and back bibs are fully faced and the button extensions work up really nicely.  Here’s a CU of the side placket.

All told, it was about 45 minutes to trace and cut and another 3 1/2 to sew it up.  I did forget the belt loops but by the time I remembered, I was going to have to get my seam ripper involved to fix the oversight so I just left it as it was.  Ellie really liked it and I almost wish the dress came in larger sizes – I could definitely see this working up in a myriad of ways.