monk bag

I've been so busy doing everything *besides* sewing and blogging about sewing that I totally missed my one-year anniversary of this blog! It's been 13 months since I began this blog with my very first post. Hooray. Happy Birthday sewing blog!

Anyways, I did actually sew a little something yesterday. I've been wanting to make this bag from The Purl Bee as a gift for someone special, but I decided that I should do a test run first. So, here is a shot of the prototype...

The style of the bag is super cute. It is a cross-body bag, and I would have modeled it for you, but the outfit I was wearing while sewing yesterday was hideously sloppy (and I was too lazy to change). Click here to see the tutorial and a lovely picture of the pattern designer sporting her monk bag.

Both of the fabrics I used for this bag were found at JoAnn Fabrics. I actually did not purchase them together - I bought the Cot Cot Codet fabric about a year ago and the dot-stripe fabric a few weeks ago (both just random I love this fabric pattern and it's on sale! purchases). Imagine my delight when I realized the two fabrics were a perfect match! They totally begged me to become an apron, but I figured who doesn't like a chicken bag (even if I don't speak French)?

I will definitely make this bag for my special birthday friend, but I think I'll use a heavier decorator-weight fabric like Mari, the tutorial creator, uses. I will also do a better job cutting my pieces out - I did heed Mari's warning about being exact in my cutting, but I'm kind of messy when I cut. And iron. And pin. In fact, this is a good skill improvement/anti-sloppiness project. I'm also thinking of making a kid-size monk bag for each of my little guys so that they can tote their own books on our visits to the library.

:) Shelly