YEAH ME! I’m late admitting to this, I agree.  Rhonda prodded me into announcing to the world that I won the Handbag Contest on Pattern Review.  I imagine everyone knows this by now, but I should make it official. 

Truthfully, winning the contest was just the icing on the cake, so to speak.  I am happy that I tried something new- using a handbag frame, and using leather too actually.  I found a GREAT new company (and another reason to get to Australia some day!), and I always get compliments on the handbag when I am out.  It is a compliment kind of bag. 

It was a winning kind of couple of weeks actually.  I got a call that I won a $40.00 Gift Certificate in Fabricland’s Anniversary draw too.  Jeepers.  You mean I have to buy some more fabric? Or patterns?  Now if only my boss will call and tell me that I got that promotion I was angling for! 

Wish for some sunny Wednesday’s for the rest of the summer would you?  I am tired of my Wednesday golf and baseball games being rained out!

I fell off the “Nope, not buying a thing” wagon hard this week.  Ann at Gorgeous Fabrics had a great sale and I had had a certain fabric in my shopping cart a million times in the past few months, only to say to myself. “Self, you do not need to buy it.  Use some self control here girl!”  Well I ignored my inner voice and finally got it – and eight other cuts too!  I just recieved the email that said the package is on the UPS truck.  Yippy!

And then there was Jalie.  Melissa was kind  enough to mention that there were three new Jalie patterns out.  It’s okay Melissa, I did get the email too- but I heard it from you first!  They are pretty smart over there at Jalie.  The buy 3 get the 4th free always suckers me in.  There were a couple that I do not have that I need  (that’s my story!) so I got 8 altogether. Yeah- suckered in!  But I figure that My Mike gets new long johns out of the deal so it all works out.

Here are the new ones.  I don’t have an empire style pattern top, I am on the lookout for a good mock-turtle tee, and I don’t have either the Ottobre gathered neck tee or the Hot Patterns Sunshine tee patterns, so they were all ”need to get” patterns.  Just building my “staples” collection you understand.   See- I do have my reasons!

We are off to see a great musical at our local theatre tonight. “Twist and Shout”  I will be in a rockin’ frame of mind tomorrow!

In case you did not see the review on PatternReview, here it is.

Pattern Description: 300 mm Square “Snap” handbag. From the website – “This little framed bag is a bit retro, and EXTREMELY cute.” Nicole Mallalieu Design is a company in Australia. Before discovering this website I had not heard of her before, but I do now see mention of her handbags(always a postitive mention) on other blogs. http://www.nicolemdesign.com.au/

Pattern Sizing: None – well actually the frame is 300 mm (11.75 inches). The finished size is about 40.5 cm (16 inches) wide by about 14 cm (5.5 inches) tall.

Did it look like the photo/drawing on the pattern envelope once you were done sewing with it? Exactly. Even to the EXTREME cuteness!

Were the instructions easy to follow? Yes and no. The instructions were VERY detailed. There are so many instructions in fact that the first words are “Don’t Panic”! There are instructions on how to use the instructions!
I read them through first which was both a good idea and a bad idea! While it gave me a basic understanding of the order, it was getting a bit overwhelming reading! I mean 20 pages of instructions is a lot! There were a few “Huh???” moments, but really when I got into the actual construction, it fell together nicely.
The pattern pieces are well marked – perfectly marked in fact, and there are even instructions on how/where to mark the pattern pieces- ie on the right side, on the wrong side etc. This was an excellent part of the instructions as it prevented one from unnecessary marking or losing them.

What did you particularly like or dislike about the pattern? I fell in love with the pattern the second I saw it. I was cruising round the net, looking for how in the world to use the handbag frames I bought in NYC. I found Nicole, we emailed back and forth a few times and 2 weeks later I had a pattern. And 2 frames. And one whole kit- which I used to make the first one. I decided to buy the kit as I wanted to see what materials were used. I had never made a handbag like this before. I adore the shape, and the ease of putting it together. The markings were in exactly the right place every time.

Dislikes - NOT A ONE!!

Fabric Used: For this one – a bronze-y alligator leather that I picked up in NYC on PR Weekend. Sewing it was a brute at times! I used some bronze lining that I had stashed. The contrast handle was also stash.

Construction Details: Construction was straightforward. All of the seams are straight seams and sewing in the corners, while a bit finickity, was not difficult. Working with leather generally requires a Teflon or roller foot. I used to have a teflon foot, but it ran away from home and never came back. So I got ingenious (and cheap) and ran out to our workshop where I stole the roll of Telfon tape and stretched some onto one of my regular feet. That worked well! It had to be replaced occasionally but still cheaper than a teflon foot. The materials list for this project included 40 cm by 11.5 cm of main fabric. I had about 4.5 square feet of leather (leather is measured by area). This amount was sufficient- barely! One ingenious tip in the instructions was to handsew a narrow cord on the the top seamline where the body would be inserted in the frame. This was to add stability and boy, did it ever help! To construct the leather straps, I cut the leather strips so that when folded in half they would overlap a titch. I first glued them down, left them overnight then topstitched. I hand stitched them on to the rectangular rings (um- can rings be rectangular??) and then glued narrow strips of leather around where they were stitched. I would like to add a metal snap or something there – but I have to first find what I am looking for.<
For a hard base I used some corrugated cardboard (I actually cut up one of my husband’s election signs, but what he doesn’t know won’t hurt him! I’ll just tell him that I wanted to carry part of him with me!)
I was worried about the part where they have you put the body in the frame. “How the heck was this going to work”, I wondered. It went together surprisingly easy. I put some glue in the channel of the handles, made some markings on the purse and on the frame to make sure things lined up, grabbbed a dull knife and started – well- stuffing! It fit beautifully with no swearing and the cording really made it fit well. It was suggested that I could crimp the edges of the frame, but I found no reason to do so- it is very secure. I wiped up the excessive glue, and had a To-Die-For handbag. Well in my opinion anyways! Looking at the photos, I have to say it looks better even in person- so come visit and see!

Pattern Alterations or any design changes you made: I only changed a few things. The instructions for the portion of the handles on the bag itself had you topstitch 3 or 4 rows before sewing them on to the fabric , then topstitching OVER the previous topstitching to attatch it to the main fabric. I can’t topstitch straight for the life of me, so I opted to first topstitch the inside 2 rows then topstitch the outside two rows right on to the purse. Here- a few pictures are worth a thousand of my words! You can also see the topstitch guide I used.
I added an inside key leash a la Ann Steeves as well. I considered pockets, but decided that this purse is not “right” for pockets.
What is great about this pattern is the possibility for may design changes- handles, hardware, fabrics, even length.
Even the bottom is pretty!

Would you sew it again? Would you recommend it to others? Definately and Definately! Nicole is Extremely Easy to correspond with, and made my first Australian purchase a breeze! The time involved in obtaining the handbag, from my initial inquiry to seeing the flag up on the mailbox was only about 2 weeks! I have already made it twice, and have been commissioned by one of the FFCX5’s (for the unintiated, that is “Fashion Critics Times 5″ which is what I lovingly -most of the time- call my 5 daughters!) Anyways, FCX5 #2 wants a narrower black one, so I will adapt the pattern to fit a handle I already own.
I haven’t carried it out of the house yet (although I will admit to slinging it over my arm and parading around the house with it!) The handbag I made as a prototype has garnered many compliments though.
Conclusion All in all a wonderful pattern! I accomplished something that I never thought I would do, and I love the result. I will most certainly see what else Nicole Mallalieu Design has to offer! Here is photo with “She. the dress form” to show the scale.I have a few more details about the handbag here on my blog – And you can see all the photos (there are a lot!)on Picasa -http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/connie.bontje/Leatherpurse

I found some time to work on the purse this week.  Bontje Baby Girl # 4  whoops #2- moved out last week (again!) and the house has been too quiet, but now I feel like I can get work done.  It will stay that way until Bontje Baby Girl # 5 comes home from University for the summer, then we will be sure to have chaos again!  The best news of the morning has been that Bontje Baby Girl # 3   )whoops 4!)called home to announce that she had just handed in her LAST university paper and is now officially a university graduate.  Congrats Leah!  (apparently my children numbering skills are poor this week!)

Oh right- the purse.  First off, I should mention some sewing type items.(consider this the blog version of “housekeeping” items at a conference.  You know, when the moderator goes up to the podium and declares such mundane facts as “breakfast will be available in the solarium tomorrow morning beginning at 7:30am”, or ”last night someone left their room key in the hospitality suite. You can see me later to retrieve it”.)  Unimportant, yet relevant facts.

So, housekeeping details…  I used to have a teflon foot – I LOVED that foot.  One day I was doing a mad, frenzied cleaning of the sewing room.  I no longer have that foot.  I think it went out in the garbage. I paid like $25 for that sucker!  One day -soon- I will have one again.  So now instead of a telfon foot, I went to the workshop and stole our Teflon tape.  I keep it by the sewing machine and put some on my regular foot whenever I need a teflon foot.  It only lasts for a little while, but it does the trick.  Also I was having some difficulties getting the leather to move. I tried stabilizer, wax paper, baby powder – the wax paper worked the best, but ultimately I adjusted the presser foot all the way up – down- as heavy as it will go – on my machine that means 9. That worked best.  Okay enough sewing info. On to the purse.

The handles were first.  I decided to go with a two-part handle using 2 different materials.  A bronzey wool for  on the body and the leather for handles themselves. 

The straps required 4 rows of topsitiching.  Now I am not the neatest topstitcher in Thorndale! (actually that prize goes to Miss Lauren(Bontje Baby Girl #5), so I decided to use I tip I read and use a Post-it note pad as a guide.  If this is your tip please let me know so that I can attribute it correctly.  I like to give credit where credit is due, and this one deserves acknowledgement.The first photo is the Post-it note taped 10mm from the needle.Photo #2 Topstitching the strap.  For the straps on the purse body, I decided to initially only topstich the middle two rows.  The pattern says to do all rows, then topstitch it on to the purse body over top of the first rows.  This would, in my opinion, look messy.  I did the outside two rows of topstitching when I sewed them on to the purse body.Photo #3 There it is!

I hand sewed the rectangular rings(?) (whatever the heck they are called) to the straps.  You cannot tell from the photo, but I need to add some hand topstitches to make the strap look complete.

Here are the leather straps- I simply cut the leather a 2 1/4 inches wide.  Then I glued them in half, overlapping  the raw edges slightly to make the desired 1 inch finished strap.  I left them overnight and topsitched them this morning.

Oh I almost forgot to mention this little part.  The pattern has you sew on some boning on the wadding under where the strap goes. Like this-It is a bit hard to see- okay I admit it, a LOT hard to see, but it is something that I would never think of doing on my own and it makes the body more stable.  And luckily for me I had exactly – to the centimetre- enough plastic boning.  I usually only have steel spiral, but happened to find a small piece.  Otherwise I would have had to go back to the workshop and hunt up some cable ties!

Next up – the body!

I love purses, but I absolutely hate to buy them.  I’m  cheap frugal conservative with my pocketbook.  Having said that, my most beloved is, of course, the utterly gorgeous Coach handbag that my darlings bought for me for Christmas last year!  But one cannot carry a Coach around every day, and I did read somewhere that it devalues a designer handbag to carry it with, say, grungy sweats to the corner store!  Sewing a designer handbag seemed like the perfect answer.

When I was  in New York, I bought some handbag frames.  Cindy Ann and I both bought a couple, but were utterly at a loss as to how to actually use them!  So began my quest for the perfect handbag pattern.

Imagine my delight when I discovered Nicole Mallalieu!  18 designs and she has classes too!  Now while I could not justify a plane ticket for the class(she is in Australia), – now wouldn’t that make for an expensive bag!- I knew that I had to have one of her patterns. A couple of nice conversations via email, and a couple of weeks later, I had the handles and the pattern for the 300mm Square Snap  in my hot little hand. It is rated for advanced sewers.  

The directions are long, but after reading them through, Irealized that they are long in order to help out less experienced sewists.  Now, being a bonifide Couturesmith (that is where I need to insert a laugh track!) I pretty well could imagine it through.  If you take it step by step, it becomes more obvious as you go as to what is going on and what is next.  I had a couple of “duh?” moments, but usually I was trying to make it more difficult than it needed to be.  There is  a complete list of supplies needed on the website, and Nicole has them all available to order.  I will do a full and proper review when the version for the  PatternReview Purse Contest is done, but meanwhile here is a photo -a pretty poor one! Eventually there will be beading on it….yeah…eventually!  Summerset I am not!

The photo’s will be more in depth as I get into the new version.  I want to be able to show the construction process, and it will be infinately easier with the leather.

The new dilemma is the leather version I am making for the Pattern Review Purse Contest.

The fabric is a to-die-for greenish, brownish – actually olive-y alligator leather that I bought in New York City. Okay – not too sure about the alligator part- I guess I don’t know my reptiles very well(I must have been reading Nancy Drew during that 5th grade class!)  Question of the day is what to do about the handles?  Using the same leather would be too – um- too.  In my opinion.  Black? A greenish mystery fabric?  Gosh I just don’t know! I can generally tell when something is “wrong”, but finding the “right” is a bit of a challenge here.  Here is a thought. The mystery fabric for the body, then switch to the leather for the actual handles.  I am using rectangular rings so the option to change the fabric is there.  Here are the alternatives. 

1.  Black

2.  Green pigsuede 

3.  olive fabric for the body and alligator for the handles(using gold not silver rectangular rings.

I’m kind of partial to the last one.  In person it looks best.  

Hmm -Formatting difficulties abound! Well the indignity of it all- in the blog editor everything looked so pretty! Erica if you can fix this up please do!  Everyone else – the pics should be self explanatory.  Black first, green pigsuede second, yada yada..

Oh yes, and here is my Excellent Blog Award (Thanks Karen!)- I think everyone in the universe already has one, but just in case, Lorna and RHonda, and Kim- passing it on to you! 

And now back to our regularly scheduled blogging!

I can’t believe it has been so long since I last blogged.  The regular old excuses are there- a new job that for a while had me commuting an hour and a half away (and for a gal who is used to commuting a 2 minute walk away that is a big change!),  the latest edition of our community Dinner Theatre that I always have a large role in (this year it was onstage as opposed to stage managing), and now, an unexpected accident in the family that takes our new son-in -law away from the farm for a while.  He will be fine- if you want to read about it, head over to my favourite blog in the world, the one that belongs to my girls- http://www.fiveblondes.com/health/an-unfortunate-accident/

Then there was that whole insecure – every one but me is having fun blogging and giving each other those great blog awards and I was feeling left out… and undesirable…and started the “nobody likes me, everybody hates me” song. 

Luckily the sun came out, I got a much deserved kick in the pants (Thanks Karen, Kate, and Erica, and Leah, and Lauren!) and started to sew again!  I will snap some photos tonight and start blogging in ernest tomorrow.  Miss Lauren has a new house lined up in Ottawa for University next fall, and was so excited to text me with the information that “mom, our new house is a two minute walk from a Fabricland!!” Hmm – I’m not too certain how that last piece of information stuck itself in there right out of the blue- but it is cute!

Oh yes, a cool Patternreview-y thing happened to me yesterday.  I was in Guelph for work, and stopped by Fabricland to pick up these two Vogue Patterns                                   

I overheard (I confess that I eavesdrop on interesting conversations an awful lot) a lady talking about the dire need to get some pictures taken.  It sounded like a Patternreview thing(!) so I casually mentioned to the woman cutting my fabric- oh did I forget to mention that I bought some fabric too!  A few yards of red, and a few yards of a great yellow for jackets, but I digress.  Anyways I asked the woman who was cutting, if the other woman was taking photos for something for PAtternReview.  “Oh it was for some internet site thingy” she replied.  Some internet thingy???!!! I don’t think Patternreview has ever been described that way!  Any how, the lady I was asking about overheard me and said “well actually it is for the Timmel Swap, but I do belong to PR as well!  We introduced ourselves and were both tickled pink that we could go home and declare that “See, PR people are REAL- not just virtual friends”!  While I have met a lot of PR members, I do not think she has, and we are trying to make plans to get together again.

Next up – a comparison of two favourite pant patterns, and my new TNT pant pattern outcome and Tada! my first finished Nicole M purse - complete strangers have asked me about this one!  Here is a sneak preview of the purse in progress... 

Ahh – It’s good to be back – let me know if you missed me at all!

I have been lusting after making a red leather purse – really lusting!  Now while I have sewn a TON of bags in my time,  I have shyed shieed not attempted a purse with a frame before.

On my blog wanderings last month I came across this website NicoleMdesign.com.au She has some fabulous purses and I fell in love with this one                         

I corresponded with Nicole ( well okay – I don’t really know how big her business is, so it could have been an employee too!) All emails and inquiries were handled quickly and in a very friendly manner.  I ordered one entire kit and one extra set of handles.  The reason I ordered an entire kit was to see what materials she uses in the interior of the purse.  I know what I would use and how I would sew it, but I wanted an expert opinion.

It came quickly – having not ordered from Australia before I was uncertain as to how long it would be in transit.  I think it was 2 weeks between ordering and the red flag going up on the mailbox.  The instructions are detailed and the pattern easy to understand.  Here is the first line of her instructions on how to use the instructions.

DON”T PANIC

Cute!

This purse is rated with 4 “flowers” which means it is for someone with advanced sewing skills.  She has lots of other purses with different ratings on her site.

Now off to find the right red leather- any suggestions?

haven’t started on it yet - I haven’t found the right red leather yet, AND I have 4 UFO’s that are screaming at me to finish them.  Sigh, some one remind me WHY I wanted another job!  The good news is is that the new barn is next to done- with any luck my babies (can you call 300 four hundred pound sows babies?) will be happy in their new home by the end of the weekend.  My life will be easier and the sows will be happier!