My entry for Bag Week

Ok, Ok, I know it's called Purse Week, but to me a purse is a small thing you put money and cards in... a bag is anything that you put stuff in, including your purse!  If you don't know about Bag Week, go here to see details and go here to see the entries.

A week or so ago I won a giveaway hosted by Dee at Dee-tails.  She very generously offered up some fabric (I'll show you when it arrives) and a wonderful bag pattern for the Rosie Patchwork Bag.  The pattern is by the lovely Mrs H and is available in The Handmade by Mrs H shop.   You can see what other people have made with her patterns in her flickr group and you can find Samantha's blog here.

Ages ago I bought a charm pack of Le Petit Ecole and warbled on about how much I loved it.  My lovely friend Nancy then sent me some fat quarters of this line.  She really is a gem, thanks Nancy!  I've been stroking them for a while, but decided that this was their time to shine.  The pattern (which is excellent by the way - very well written and Mrs H didn't pay me to say that) called for patchwork squares.  I think you all know my slapdash approach to points lining up - if they do, they do, if they don't, tough!  Well, for this bag it was different.  Where they didn't match up, I ripped them out.  See?

And finally ended up with two pieces of perfectly aligned patchwork.

See?  See those points matching?  No?  Well have another look, admire them ladies, you may never see it again on this blog!

I added in some of the last of the linen from the Zakka Style Sew Along and...

Here she is!

I did some quilting on the patchwork (because Mrs H told me too, it wasn't my idea) and it didn't turn out too bad.

In the photo above the bag is stuffed with my ironing cloths and a towl, in the photo below it's empty, but it still looks kind of puffy, love it!

 

It closes with a magnetic closure.  One side of the lining (a piece of light brown fabric I found in my stash, no idea where it came from) has a zipper pocket. Mrs H does zipper pockets the same way as I do (well OK, technically as Lisa Lam does and I copy from!) so there was no conflict of interest and no cursing.

 

The other side has a slip pocket which I divided into three.

The only thing I did differently from the pattern was the handles.  I think you know I don't like the fold and stitch method.  Well, that was a bit of a disaster as despite having worked as an estimator for years (i.e. with complicated calculations and formulae) I messed up the maths and produced very wide handles, too wide for the bag.  I tried to cut them down and ended up with two different sized, tapered, too small handles.  In the bin! 

So there we go.  Posie Patchwork Bag - done.  Purse Week - done. 

By the way, are you joining in with the Handcrafted Holiday Sew and Stitch Along?  If not, then get yourself over there: