Cosmo!

Update from last week's projects: My Cosmo Bag is done! This was sort of an accidental project; I found out that JemJam was hosting a sew-along, and I thought "hmm, that's nice." Then I saw the fabrics a friend had picked out to make her Cosmo bag, and I really wanted to get involved. Why? I don't know. I think it might have been because I liked my friend's fabrics. And the fact that she pulled them all from her stash was certainly appealing. I began to wonder what I could pull together from my stash. But I didn't have the book, and I didn't want to buy the book.

And then I needed to order orange faux fur. Yes, you heard me right. 1.5 inch long, orange shaggy faux fur for a custom-ordered lion costume. All I can say is God Bless fabric.com, because where on earth else would I find something as amazing as what they sent me (and it was on sale, too!) But in order to get free shipping, I needed $35 worth of merchandise in my cart so... in went Amy Butler's Style Stitches.

Well, once that book arrived, it was all I could think about. It didn't take me long to select my fabrics, and I cut the pieces out while watching Pride and Prejudice. Gosh, I love that movie! It makes even tedious fabric cutting utterly delightful.


First of all, this bag is BIG. Like, pack for an entire weekend big. I've even seen pictures that people have taken of their not-so-small children in this bag! The worst thing I can say about it is that it took an absurd amount of interfacing (around 6 yards), because it went together very nicely after everything was cut out and interfaced. Upon the recommendation of a fellow sewer-alonger, I used plastic canvas to stiffen the bottom of the bag, which gives it a little more structure, and I also added a zipper to part of one of the interior pockets to secure things that need securing. Overall, I am really happy with how it turned out, but I'm not an enormous bag kind of girl, so I think I'll put it in my etsy shop. The very best part was that each and every component, even the interfacing, even the perfect little pink zipper and even the adorable vintage button all came from my stash. Yay me!

Other things I did this week:

1) Continued on the hat I started knitting for myself last week. It's about 70% done.

2) Made a yellow lion costume with an orange fux fur mane :o)

3) Cleaned up my sewing room a little more. Decided to evict the neglected scrapbooking supplies. Still not anywhere close to being ready to paint, and I have lots of other orders that will be taking up my time.

This coming week will be devoted to the Donald & Daisy Duck costumes that have been ordered, and then a monster clean-up from all the left over orange fur and white duck fluff before I move back to my good old woven cotton that does not shed all over me and my sewing room.