Bag lady!!

I just finished this bag the other day. It's a design by Louise from my favourite fabric shop, 'White Cottage Country Crafts'. It's not on their website at the moment, but the pattern is available at the shop. I think their website is a recent addition and I would say, not finished yet, as not everything is priced up properly and their fabric range is much much more than you see on the website. I've tinkered with the pattern slightly because I wanted to use the lovely brown beaded trim I bought last week at the Malvern Quilt Festival, which, as you can see, I have put down the front. The original bag design has a flap, but that would have deflected from the trim, so I left it off .... I may put a magnetic clasp on the inside perhaps to stop it from gaping open. I love the way the handle is formed, which you can see in the next photograph, by twisting the ends over each other and then stitching them together - a clever idea don't you think and a bit different?

I added 2 pockets inside - one for my mobile, plus another one - a lady can never have enough pockets in her bag can she?!! I'm keeping this bag for me ................

but the next one is a present for my dear cousin Pauline, who will be 60 years old shortly .......... shhhhhhh, don't let her know I told her age for all to see - she'd have my guts for garters!! I purchased this pattern from a shop called 'Abigail's Crafts' and is made very simply using 9 strips from a jelly roll and, again, I strayed a little bit from the original look of the bag by adding the lovely shell buttons instead of a fabric flower on the flap. I hope dear cousin likes it - I know she has recently bought herself new shoes in the wine/purpley colour, so they should match well enough. This isn't a brilliant picture really, because the wine/purpley colour is actually alternated with sage green, not brown as they look in the photo and there's so much shine on the buttons, it's difficult to see what a lovely colour they are - never mind though - you get the idea I hope.

That's all for now folks!!