Incoming: a new baby and a dancer with too many shoes

My former neighbor and valued dear friend Cristina is having her second baby boy.  At her request I used the same palette for this quilt as I did for her son Enzo.  See it here.   But I made too many bits for the quilt.  These bits became the best diaper bag.  What a joy to give these to here.  Even Enzo noticed that this new quilt bears a resemblance to his!  A remarkable boy…

And the other big finish this month is for my great niece Eloise.  Like her mom, Elo dances. And she has several shoes she carries.  So this bag was made to carry multiple sets of shoes and a water bottle.  This is the Aragon bag by Sew Sweetness.  One side ahas a curvy pocket.  The other side has a zip compartment.  The whole bag ones wide with a purse zipper.  And the inside feature two elastic pockets and another zip compartment. I could market this as a senior citizen special because it has so many different little places to put things.  Elo chose this fabric, and this bag will be for her first double digit birthday in January.

And last but certainly not least is my evening hand quilting project. I love this quilt.  I love my stitching.  

I’m almost at the end and sad to have this completed.  This might be my new dining room wall hanging! 

And of course little zip purses using leftover bits.  Most of them have been gifted.  After all, it is the season! 
 

                         

                         Finally, a new special project has begun.  More about this later! 

My Aragon Bag and My Fabric Crush

Yes, I just made a bed quilt for myself from these fabrics.  Now I've made a carry-on bag.  And I have a couple of leftovers - perhaps a zippered pouch?This Aragon Bag is a pattern of Sara Lawson at Sew Sweetness.  I've made several of her patterns, and I love them.   My Chicago Modern Quilt Guild had Sara for a workshop Saturday.  What a lovely day with some wonderful quilty peeps.

Sara is a great instructor - she had little demo bits for each step of the way and wasn't at all flustered by how independently we work or by how over or underprepared we all were. There's great attention to detail with this bag.  One side of the bag has a curved pocket and magnetic flap.  The other side has a zippered pocket.  Both of these details hide the raw edges of the handles.  Both sides have a little elasticized pocket - perfect for keys, phone, pacifiers, water bottles - you get the idea.  

I usually don't show the interior of a bag, but I must with this one because of the technique for finishing.  So many bags construct the bag and lining separately.  But this pattern treats them as one piece.  The problem is all the messy seams are visible from the inside and must be covered with double-sided bias tape.  I bought the wrong item at Joann's - single bias tape.  So I wound up making bias tape from my bag lining.  Yesterday I attached it by hand, and I am so impressed with how neat the interior of the bag is.  Notice one side of the interior has another zippered pocket.  The other side has two elasticized pockets.  Very practical and easy to use. 

My new favorite tool is evident on this last photo: clips! So much easier than pinning!  I love that I've added some new techniques to my purse-making repertoire.  Saturday's workshop was a great reinforcement of why it's important to read every word of directions - something I'm still learning.  I did made a pretty serious mistake but was able to figure out a work-around by channeling Tim Gunn and making it work!  I'm pretty thrilled with how this bag turned out!