Weekender Bag for Mom

Ever since my mom saw my Amy Butler weekender bag, she's wanted one as well.  So for Christmas (which for this bag came in early February) I made her one.  I followed most of the same tips that I did the last time, you can see them summarized here.  The only thing I didn't do was make a shoulder strap- surprisingly I don't use mine all that much (the weight of the bag distributes weirdly on a single shoulder strap).  On this one I just lengthened the handles so they're long enough to carry the bag over the shoulder.  I think it turned out even better than mine, and I think my mom likes it!  

One of the coolest thing about this version is that I turned the zippers around.  I had to get a parka zipper which has the zips in a tail-to-tail orientation, rather than a suitcase zipper which has the zips in a head to head orientation.  I saw some things on line that indicated you could turn them around (provided it was s non-separating zipper), but I couldn't really find any instructions.  I thought I'd be brave, so I just cut both ends off the zipper, pulled the zips off, and put them back on the other way around.   I have no idea whether that's the right way, but it totally worked, and now the zipper opens from the middle like a real suitcase!

Possibly the most exciting thing about this project is that I didn't sew over any fingers during its construction (yay)!

WIP Wednesday

Hello blogland!  I've been busy working (in the lab) and designing my Eucharistic Prayer C Quilt.  I can't show it, even in progress, but at this point, it's not even recognizable as anything, so I thought I'd go ahead and share.

It's taken a ton of design work to get to this point, but I'm now ready to screen print my first text.  Here's my background fabric all marked (the blue lines are registration lines to align my screens).  This is just the left panel, there's a right panel I haven't marked yet that's the same size.

isn't that the most boring in progress picture you've ever seen?

And these are all my silk screens.  They're made out of fusible vinyl (the black marker is scribbled on the vinyl before cutting so you can see it since it's clear) and then fused to organza.  I kept all the letters I peeled out of the screens- I'm bound and determined to do something with them but I'm not sure what yet.

I also painted this chiffon planet, but I'm really not sold on it- we'll see later whether I decide to use it, and then there are a few initials I sketched out that will be incorporated later as well.

I'm hoping to start printing tomorrow or Friday so wish me luck!

Linking up with Lee and Nina-Marie as always!