My youngest niece really loves elephants. When she was smaller she used to refer to them as "bumbos" (which I assume came from Dumbo)  and charge around the house making "bumbo" sounds. So when Purl Patchwork got the Kokka Menagerie in the tiny smiling elephant print I knew I needed to make her something out of it. When we received the new Oliver and S patterns, including the sophisticated Sunday Brunch Jacket I knew what that something would be!

As you may remember the last time I made an Oliver and S pattern I used it to conquer my fear of buttonholes. This time I had to face my fear of... sleeves. I'm a little ashamed to admit that up until this point I had only sewn sleeves under the watchful eye of my mom who is a very accomplished seamstress (she won first place in the 1966 California State Fair for a suit she made). But since this pattern is so well written it turned out that the sleeves were a breeze, I didn't have to rip the seam out even once. I also came away from this project knowing how to sew in a facing and a collar too! I highly recommend this pattern and I LOVE how it came out!

One thing that's not explained in the pattern, or really in any pattern, is how to properly sew on a button and surprisingly it's something many people don't know how to do. Once you've completed such a beautiful and complicated piece it's important to finish it properly and that means sewing the buttons on correctly.

I never paid much attention to sewing on buttons until my favorite jacket lost one about a year ago. I sewed it on tightly and with a lot of thread but it fell off again in no time. After some research I finally figured out what I'd been doing wrong. It's not about how tight you sew it on or how much thread you use. It's about letting it have some give and securing it properly. If you'd like to see what I mean you can check out my Sewing on a Button Tutorial.

A note: I used two 1 inch buttons instead of the four 5/8 inch buttons called for in the pattern. You can follow my Buttonhole Tutorial if you want to see how to markand sew your own buttonholes.