Life before coffee...

Do you suppose the world as we know it would come to a tragic end without coffee?  I’m sure my world would!  This morning, I hopped in the shower, raced off to drop my schnauzer off at the groomer before 7:30, then onto the DMV to renew my driver’s license.  I realized that something didn’t feel quite right, so I took a quick inventory and realized I was still wearing my house shoes.

Embarassing!  Thankfully a new license only includes a head shot!

Yesterday I fell in love with Albert all over again.  I had a new customer bring me a beautiful quilt she’d made for her daughter, and wanted an all over in my $0.015 psi category cost.  I was able to take a dense design and enlarge it enough to fit into that price range, an option not available when using a paper pantograph!

What a sweet quilt!  I used a pale green thread on this one, and Quilter’s Dream deluxe weight cotton.  It’s heavy!

Then I decided I needed a treat, so I spent the rest of the day making myself a new purse.  I almost love it, but not quite.  I used Soft and Stable for the batting, which was awesome… especially in the handles!  However, since it isn’t a fusible, I don’t care for the way my Moda Marble fabric looks a little “slouchy”.  The home decor fabric for the bulk of it looks fine, it’s has enough body on its own.   So I will need to either use all heavyweight fabric, or quilt the lighter weight cottons to the Soft and Stable.

This is the second time I’ve made this bag and I really like it!  It’s a great size, has interior and exterior pockets, and no one writes a better pattern than Lazy Girl Designs, a full pictorial is included!  This is her Margo handbag.  The first one I made I use for a knitting bag.

Finished purse

And it’s all done, except for the sleeve to cover the acrylic “Baggy Bottom” insert.

 I used home decor fabric from Hobby Lobby on this one.  On Friday, a friend and I are going to Little Rock to do a bit of shopping.  Not much as both of us have gimpy feet at the moment, but if we aren’t too tired, on the way back we plan to stop at the Warp and Woof in Conway.  They carry a large selection of decorator fabric and I hope to find more that I like for purses.

 

I really like this pattern a lot.  The purse is a nice size, it finishes out at 10 inches wide by 9 inches tall.  The two outside pockets are perfect for my cell phone and keys, and there are four roomy pockets inside that hold my checkbooks, plus a couple of pen pockets.

Design wall Monday

Shame on me for even working on something upstairs in my sewing room, when I have two quilts waiting to be quilted downstairs!  I’m actually feeling  a bit quilted out, and so I am going to work on other things for awhile until I get back in the groove again… that is, after I finish those two quilts!

Yesterday I started on a purse, and will finish it up this morning.  This is another “Margo” handbag by Lazy Girl Designs.

I weed whacked and mowed the yard yesterday, and flecked the smoked chickens and made broth which I left to simmer overnight, I’ll let it cool down this morning and then I’ll freeze it.  This afternoon we’re joining a couple of our neighbors and cranking ice cream, I hope it doesn’t get too hot outside!

Head over to Judy’s and see what everyone else is up to this week!

Whoa... where did my day go?

I decided no quilting today, I wanted to do some crafty sewing!  I have a new purse pattern I’ve just been dying to try, it’s a Lazy Girl design, the “Margo Handbag”.  Great way to use up some of my stash that I’m pretty sure will never make it into a quilt too!

This took me about six hours to sew… I am a quilter, I find things like this rather challenging, but it’s so much fun!

This is a really well done pattern, talk about an amazing way to install a zipper!  I’m going to have to make another, as mine isn’t perfect, I did my top stitching around the top of the purse on the lining instead of the outer section (doh!) because I’m direction challenged, but otherwise it went together very well!

There are four nice big pockets on the outside.  The pattern actually only has them on the front, but I did mine on both sides.  The inside has nice big pockets as well.

This purse is very thick, you wouldn’t want to do this on a lightweight sewing machine, the finall assembly had you sewing through a half inch thickness of combined fabric, fleece, and heavy duty interfacing.

I can’t wait to do another one!  I wonder if it will take me all day long again?

I did remember I’d promised to bake Jim a blackberry cobbler, so it’s in the oven… but I forgot about dinner!