To be a bit cliché, this shoemaker is a professional Web Developer and her child is this blog, but it was past time to launch what I have of a new design. All the content is still here, everything else is a work in progress (kind of like most of my sewing projects)!
Three presents down (including this one from last week), a handful more to go. I am making three of the cosmetics bags total—the finished one here, the one cut out and half quilted that is also shown, and one other.
Also, one more of the little zipper bags, and one or two other small things. By next Friday. Yikes! It has been fun working out the kinks in construction process for the big bags. I am not sure how to translate my finagling into a tutorial yet, though.
I haven’t been quilting lately, but I have been coming up with great ideas for the new year!
From around the web this week: The Oldest UFO from the Quilter’s Newsletter Blog. Unlike the author, all of my unfinished latchhook projects are lost to the sands of time (I can think of at least three, one might have been finished). Did you do latchhook as a child (or adult, for that matter)?
Modern Mirage from Freshly Pieced. This is my favorite quilt I saw online this week.
One Christmas present down, quite a few more to go. The journal is store bought, but I whipped up the zippered pen bag. Quick, mostly pain free, and I only had to steal one thing from another project instead of running to the store (the zipper, but I have one in another color that will work for the other project anyhow).
The rest of my planned projects aren’t quite so simple.
My youngest sister Kaite loves Vera Bradley. She not-so-subtly hinted on Facebook to our other sister that said sister should buy her a laptop backpack for her birthday last week. Sane (also broke college) person that she is, other sister said no way, and so Kaite changed tack by claiming that she loves “Rachael Arnold” more than Vera. That little equivoque earned her a cosmetic bag in addition to the rest of her combined Christmas/Birthday/Finals Week present (I’d neither the time nor inclination to try making a laptop bag).
It’s quite a nice sized bag for toiletries or sundries. It’s around 11″×7″×4″. The outer fabric is quilted to cotton batting, and the zipper spans the entire top section, curving over about an inch on either side.
One side has a small handle with her initials, and a carrying strap attached via a clasp and D-ring.
I didn’t get a good photo, but I’m rather proud of how I managed to center the design on the hand strap.
The lining material is interfaced and has a label. All in all, the bag has a lot of body and was completely empty in the photos, so you can see that it stands fine on its own.
I believe I’m going to make another one or two of these in the next month or so. After I iron out the issues I had with this one, I’ll turn it into a tutorial if anyone is interested. The problem with making up a pattern like this as you go along means I forgot things like the lining when initially constructing it, and I still don’t know the exact length of the side piece, since I just sewed it onto the front and cut off the extra.