Long day Friday

Got to do some more sewing yesterday, made two bags of the materials we cut out last week. Also got halfway through two others.

It is so much easier doing a pattern the second or third time around, having worked out the glitches and making small changes that will make the bag look better.

There were lots of breaks with phone calls and taxi service for my son, so didn't get out of the sewing room till around six!! I will post the photos tomorrow hopefully.

A Halt in the Process

I got organised to sew the bags we cut out yesterday, ironed on all the interfacing, then realised that I don't have the right colour thread for them, will have to go to Textile Traders tomorrow :( now to find something else to do...

Saturday get together.

Well we got together yesterday for a couple of hours and decided to cut out some bags. We ended up cutting out 2 Hobo Bags in a nice blue patterned material with a dark blue lining and also cut out 2 Tote bags in red, with pink and white flowery pattern as contrast. They should look very nice when put together.
Now its up to M to sew them up.
I do the nice easy things like cutting the patterns out and Moral support lol.
Will get together on Friday and probably cut some more or help finish the 4 we cut out yesterday.

Black Velvet Hobo

A friend brought over a long velvet top with long sleeves that she wanted me to make a hobo bag out of, we used an old black satin kimono with gorgeous intricate Chinese embroidery on it for the lining. The sleeves were just long enough to cut the handles out of - though we had to have a join in it, and the bag cut out of the body. I have tried taking photos of the lining, but with it being black, with black embroidery it doesn't show up in the photo unfortunately. I put two pockets inside, and she is so happy with it.

Zebra Tote Bag

Since I had bought extra Zebra print, I made a zebra and black Tote with black lining with a inside twin pocket, this was also very easy to make and looks great.

Zebra Hobo Bag

Family members have put in orders for bags, so there will be lots of bags for Christmas :)

My niece wanted a Zebra Hobo bag with black lining and one inside pocket, these are so easy to make, you can cut and sew one in a few hours. I had to buy the material for this one, as there is no knowing when I would find the right recycled material. I am hoping I wont need to do that too often.

Patterns

I currently have three patterns with 5 bags on each one, so I spent 5 never ending days tracing and cutting out all the patterns onto interfacing, by the 4th day I was so over it all, but knew it would be worth it to get it finished. Now that it is finished I am wrapped, it makes life so much easier not to have one piece for multiple bags, so I can cut out various bags at the same time, and it is so much easier to work with than paper.

Orange Bag

Here is the second bag made from leftover material from a skirt I had made. It was hard to find a contrast material that matched well, but I finally found some, I was so excited when I was able to find something to match. Again this has 4 pockets, as I think pockets are the best thing :) 2 on the outside and 2 on the inside lining. It is hard to see the contrast, but I have used it for the bottom, handle inserts, pocket border, facing and the tab.

Getting a focus on what we are going to make

We caught up do discuss what we want to make, and tools needed to make life easier for us both. And came up with lots of ideas besides bags, we want to make varios types of storage items, not just bags, so we have a long list including

• door/ wall hangers
• laundry hampers
• wardrobe space savers
• organiser rolls for crafts etc
• caddys

To get started I made this door hanger for my niece

Finding Material For the First Bag

When we decided to make recycled bags, we went to buy some patterns, basic threads and interfacing. Then the searching began, it is so exciting going into a shop not knowing if any great material will be found or not or any material at all for that matter

On my first visit I found a 2m piece of purple corduroy and a bag full of smaller pieces in a variety of colours and textures, I was so excited in getting home and experience bag making.

When I turned the material over I realised that the wrong side was burgundy (my favourite colour) so I used the wrong side as the right side :)

Taking things slowly to make sure I didn't miss anything, as well as fitting around work, family etc it took 3 days to complete. There were a few errors and I was not happy with how the bottom of the bag turned out so I will change the pattern for future use. But overall I was very happy with it. It has two handles but I think I will make the next one with one longer handle.It has 2 pockets on the outside, and 2 more on sateen lining, I love pockets!, and a Velcro tab fastener. I had so much fun making this bag, I can see myself getting hooked very easily :D

I did have to unpick the top seam as I had somehow put the handles on the wrong way, and I though I was being so careful :)

Here is the finished bag - it was very hard to see the coulour as it is so dark, so I needed to use a stronger flash as well to see some of the detail.