Off The Wagon

I confess. I have fallen off the 30/30 wagon. Not to make excuses, but I've had a lousy week with no opportunity for any sewing at all and along came a weekend with plenty of free time. I caved.

After missing seven days, I was trying to decide if it would be better to make up the time missed in a sewing marathon, start over or pick up where I left off and just keep going until I had 30 days of actual sewing in. A sewing marathon didn't seem right because it's so much easier to be productive in a large block of time than in short bursts. Starting over felt like failing. Picking up where I left off probably would have been the best option but I just needed to treat myself to something enjoyable so there you have it.

I'm working on my daughter's purse. Believe it or not, I cut 51 pieces including interfacing! 27 of those pieces have now been reduced to 4: the front (with pocket); the back (with pocket); the front lining; and the back lining (with pocket).

I started by assembling the interior pocket and lining pieces. I interfaced the pocket with a lightweight interfacing, then stitched the pocket to the pocket lining, right sides together. I turned the lining to the wrong side, pressed and edgestitched it, then basted it to the lower lining.


With the pocket constructed, I sewed the pocket assembly to the upper lining piece. Then I folded the seam allowanced towards the upper lining and edgestitched it. This completed the back lining. The front lining was easier; no pocket, so all I needed to do was sew the lower lining to the upper lining.

On to the purse front and back. Bunny had clued me in that the brocade has a tendency to shrink when fused to interfacing. Because of that, I decided on a medium stiff, sew-in interfacing for the outside of the bag. For the outside pockets, I used the same lightweight interfacing I used on the inside pocket.

The first step was to line the outside pocket pieces; I sewed the lining pieces to the pocket pieces, right sides together, along the curved edge. Because the brocade will not hold a pressed edge, I understitched the seam allowances. Then I clipped the curves and turned the lining to the wrong side. Again, because the polyester won't hold an edge, I hand basted the edge, then edgestitched.

Each outside pocket is made up of two of two pieces. Since each piece was constructed individually, I hand sewed the edges down after overlapping them. This is the front and back of one of the outside pockets.


This was my stopping point for today. I started to baste a pocket onto one of the body pieces, but the fabric was bunching in front of the presser foot. I'll just hand baste those and keep my fingers crossed when I actually assemble the bag. I looked in my manual, but couldn't find any information on decreasing the presser foot pressure. (If anyone else is using a Baby Lock Ellegante, is there a way to do that???)

***The color is SO off. Once again, the base colors of the fabrics are various shades of a mossy green.