Thursday, August 14, 2008

Finally

It only took two months, but I finally got my new makeup bag done last night. I got a sewing machine in May, after lots of jealousy over all the cool projects out there in bloggy-land. I spent a lot of time playing with aprons, and placemats and iPod covers, all of which are bright orange, because I had a huge orange sheet to practice with and I didn't want to waste any good fabric. My first non-orange project was a little makeup bag. The outer layer is from a green striped remnant that I picked up cheap and the inner lining is a gorgeous Robert Kauffman fabric that was a gift from my mom (and that I was terrified to cut into).

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It took approximately 30 minutes to make the whole thing, plus three hours to handstitch the lining in. Yes, I am a very slow hand sewer, and I was also being obsessive. I loved it so much that I immediately made another one, exactly the same, and gave it to my sister.

Sadly, it is just a little bit too small to hold my all my makeup comfortably and I decided to make another one with different fabric. That's when I learned I must have just gotten lucky the first time. I carefully cut and measured and pressed and sewed and when I tried to put the two pieces together, the inner lining was too big. I ripped out stitches and re-did it and got the same result. Apparently, the inner lining stretches a LOT and the outer layer is not at all stretchy. I did what any sane person would do and shoved it in my work basket for a month.

Last night, with the Olympics on for moral support, I dug it out and re-did it. It took two more tries, and a lot of swearing, but I finally conquered that bag!

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The outer lining is black, and just faintly striped.

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The inner lining is a flower print, which I picked because I liked the way the black flowers jumped out. Again, a gift from my mom, whose fabric stash is unbelievable.

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And it holds all my makeup!

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Just for comparison, here are both bags. I tried to pick the most easily identifiable object to show the scale - after all, who doesn't know the exact size of a tube of Great Lash?

I am so relieved that I got that finished. I have a hard time moving on to other projects if I have a ton of half finished work.

4 comments:

  1. this is unbelievable! i completely understand your frustration, but i'm so impressed you whipped it out again. the contrast of the floral pattern against the black is flawless. xxx

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  2. You are adorable. I love those fabrics. Hey, did I tell you my mom in law bought me a sewing machine for Christmas last year? I will give you a week's worth of free flowers if you help me learn to use it. I need to figure out how to make some essentials like table runners, bouquet wraps, sashes, etc.
    Love you,
    Kristin Brancaleone

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  3. Hey there! My sister and I are addicted to creative blogs and she told me about yours today. She's apparently been a regular reader for a while. Being that I'm new, I probably missed this, but do you mind if I ask where you're getting your patterns from? I'd love to know. But if they all come from your head...then congrats. :) That's awesome. haha

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  4. I work in a fabric store and we totally have an entire bolt of that liner fabric for like 5.99 a yard or something really cheap. Sorry I saw this and freaked because i put it away today and contemplated snacking up a yard for something on my break.

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