Eccentric Piecing

My plan for Saturday was to sleep in, have breakfast downtown, journal in the sunlight, and meander along main street checking out the dress and second hand shops - for details - just looking - no buying. Plans change. Instead,  I woke up wanting to sew and there was no reason not to so I spent a very productive twelve hours in the studio in part because...

... on Friday I started taking apart The Portfolio Bag and by Friday night had cut out the main sections of four new bags. Any thing that is sitting around my home unused and doesn't have strong sentimental value to an unsentimental person is subject to recycling. This bag had been used twice and was awkward to store. The original was made forever ago. I don't even remember exactly when although I do remember it was for my appearance on Alex Anderson's show Simply Quilts to talk about my book Setting Up Your Sewing Space (oop). The bag was designed to hold a cutting mat, pressing board, and other quilting supplies.

There was extensive thread work over the surface and the flap was completely beaded. Both made great starting points for new bags. Since I cleaned out all my remnants a few years ago, there were no bits of the original fabrics left in the studio but I still have the same thread and beads. It's amazing what a treasure trove my studio is. I was celebrating that awareness as I moved about with ease finding everything I needed and having the opportunity - finally - to use some of those stashed supplies. VERY fun.

The thread above is Poly Neon color 1600. It's a fabulous color combo that I would LOVE to have more of only suppliers are hard to find and the last one didn't have this color. If you come across it, I'm interested. 

Recycling involves a lot of thread bits. A lint roller works particularly well for cleaning up the surfaces otherwise those bits end up stitched into seams and it's a lot more work getting them out.

With this recycling project, there is absolute zero waste except for literal garbage scraps. It's as close to using everything as I'm likely to come. Two of the bags have pockets and linings made from the original mottled pink lining. For the third one, I cut up a prissy raw silk blouse that went straight from the sewing machine into recycling because it totally didn't suit me but works great for this. I haven't started on the lining for the fourth bag yet however there's some pink silk left and we'll see what happens. I'll be sure to include in my bio that eccentric piecing is part of the charm of these bags.

Two of the bags have a rounded, wide at the bottom, narrow at the top shape. The bottoms are too narrow for four feet - two at each end - so I put three with one in the middle. One bag is complete, one needs some beading on the flap, and one needs a handle which I'll make along with the handle for the fourth one that I'm working on now. They should be finished soon but not today because I'm off on a road trip to Ikea hopefully returning with an island for my kitchen. I say hopefully because Ikea absolutely refuses to hold anything for pick-up even though you're coming from out of town and are willing to pay in advance by credit card. FRUSTRATING. They had six in stock last week so...

Talk soon - Myrna

Grateful - a fabulous sewcation and safe return of the family