Evening Clutch for a tropical wedding

...soooo I was recently a guest at a wedding in Queensland.  I found the perfect outfit, the perfect shoes etc. but couldn't find a clutch in a particular shade of purple to match my dress.  These are the sort of challenges I revel in, so I decided to make the clutch myself in a gorgeous satin fabric from my local Lincraft store. I was a bit daunted by the slippery fabric but I'm pleased that it turned out so well. I have featured it as this months' blog pic.  It is lined in a similar, but not so slippery, fabric and has a magnetic catch under the flap.

I couldn't find a suitable 'evening' button that wasn't tizzy so I decided to go with a rectangular piece of bag hardware artfully secured with wire.

The pic shows it as a little too blue, but in fact it is the exact purple in the dress it sits on top of.

I love the edge stitching detail

Tell me what you think.

2015 - Home town; new house; new creativity

Hi all, Thanks for sticking with me over the huge break while I moved house. I have made the move back from country Victoria to Melbourne, my home town.  I'm loving decorating my new house and am in the process of setting up a dedicated sewing/craft room (luxury!) Thanks to IKEA for solving my shelving and storage needs. The room is still a work in progress;  I continue to investigate storage for the myriad of ingredients needed to feed my creative urge. Now I have somewhere for my growing collection of how-to books.

Thanks to the man of the house and his trusty drill & hammer. Oh how I love an empty shelf!

One...

Two...

Three...

All done!

I've also gone a bit crazy with the Dymo labeller but, hey, that's what we Virgos are good at - organisation!  Now I can find everything with a glance in my pull-out drawers from Masters Home Improvements.

I even stuffed all my wool into the bottom 2 drawers

I'm branching out into homewares. Let's face it, if you can sew a complicated bag, making placemats is a walk in the park!  So my next episode will be how to sew double-sided placements, instructions included.

Watch this space.

Flash Harry is taking a long break to move back to Melbourne. My new house awaits...... I'll keep you posted.

Ooh La La! New Bag

Fresh off the sewing machine is my new bag, Women of Paris, named after the fabric itself. This is a version of the Baby Glam Bag but smaller and more hand-bag-y.  I've added a generous pocket at each side which gives a nice structure to the bag, a further inside pocket and a crocodile clip inside for those pesky keys you can never find.  

Side pocket

Inside crocodile clip

Button detail

The unique button for the closure is a one-off I obtained at the Buttonmania store in Swanston Street, Melbourne.  Nice buttons and nice people!  I'm sure they won't mind me giving them a plug here.

http://www.buttonmania.com.au/

Apparently they are having one of their clearance sales very soon.  If you're into buttons, buckles and notions don't miss it.