My first Ottobre dress!

Using some gift money, I recently subscribed to the Ottobre magazine, and I finally got my first issue this week! Excitement! Ottobre is designed in Finland, and I just love the pattern designs. I received lots of encouragement from the ladies on the Ottobre sewing list and the Ottobre Flickr group. Thank you!

This pattern is called the "Rose" dress from the 1/08 issue, and I made it for Emily using fabric and buttons from my stash. The only notion I had to buy was the velvet ribbon. I already had the matching flower that I put at center front.

Changes I made from the original pattern:

• I used a bias band on the sleeve edge instead of elastic.
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• I sewed a back placket and made a button opening instead of using a zipper.
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• I added a bias band at the hemline with the same coordinating fabric as the neck and sleeve bindings.
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• I made a matching panties cover with the coordinating fabric. (Little girls this age always pull up their dresses--well, at least my little girl does).
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• This dress is a size 98 lengthened to size 104. It's a bit longer than I like on Emily, but she is growing like a weed.

I really like the front gathers on the dress, but it was a bit finicky to get them just right. I think it was a bit more difficult because I changed the method of sewing on the ribbon. Instead of sewing separate pieces of the ribbon to the front and 2 back pieces before sewing the side seams, I first sewed the side seams and then used one continuous piece of ribbon around the dress. I like the finished results a lot better doing this my way, but it did take a bit of playing around and measuring everything correctly.

The dress seems a bit wide through the chest as several people on the Ottobre discussion group have mentioned. I tend to think of this as a design element, but yes, the dress is somewhat wide through the bodice. This would work well on a chubby child, though.

Overall I am very pleased with my first sewing project from Ottobre Designs. Emily didn't want to take the dress off after I took her pictures, so I guess that means she likes it too!

Ruth