Friday, March 25, 2011

A Purse & A Diaper Bag In One Week? I Must Be Dreaming....

Seriously.... I don't think I've gotten this much sewing done in one week since Cael was born.  Sure, I've made diapers and a few pieces of clothing for the kids.  But, nothing and I mean nothing like this.  My new machine just buzzed.  It sews like a dream.  And these two bags are proof of that.

Early this week I decided it was time to stop the insane amount of "Spring" cleaning that I've been doing and sew myself a new purse.  My "me" purse is about to loose a strap.  I looked and looked for a pattern that I liked.  I decided on this one.  The Wasp Bag.  I was hopping that it would be small enough for my purse, but large enough to throw a few diapers and baby necessities in when going out for quick trips. 
  I started with some quilting cottons that I bought a few weeks ago with the intention of making a diaper bag with.  I love love love this bird fabric.  The colors are so me.  I altered the insides by adding some pockets and a key fob thingy.  It has a magnet closure.  The buttons are from my grandmothers old stash.  They are mother of purl with greenish tint in the crevices.  Perfect.   I think this is the nicest purse I've ever made and it did turn out big enough to add baby things to!  I'm planning on making up a sort of wrist wallet/mini purse to put inside this.  So all I have to do is grab one thing to throw into the big diaper bag when I need it.

After a successful sewing session with my Wasp Bag I started on a diaper bag.  This one took me longer to decide on.  There are so many patterns out there for diaper bags and I really wanted on that didn't look to "diaper bag"ish.  I want to be able to use this bag after I'm done using it for the baby.  I settled on this pattern.  For the fabrics I decided to go bold.  To use something that I normally wouldn't.  I've had these fabrics in the house for a few years now.  They are both heavy weight metalic quilting cottons.  I actually have this same pattern in a baby blue, light sage green, and a purply fuscia.  I used some plain ol' white for the interior as I had nothing that co-ordinated good enough.  It'll make it easy to see inside.  

Front of the bag.  Close up shows how the exterior is actually three pockets. 
 The back of the bag has one large pocket with a velcro closure.  I eventually want to make a co-ordinating changing cloth that will go in this pocket.
For this pattern I added a key fob thingy and more pockets.  It closes with a magnetic snap on the flap. I used a medium weight fusible interface on the straps, bottom, and exterior pockets.  And a light weight fusible interface on the interior.  It really made the bag nice and sturdy.   There is soooo much room in this bag.  With all his things there is still room inside for an extra blanket, water bottles, etc.  This bag will carry us for a long time.  And, I have to say the colors look so much better in person.  These night time photos aren't doing this bag justice.

2 comments:

Jenny Squawk said...

These are two bags I'm considering making for a diaper bag. The wasp, I just like the look of it, but not sure it would be big enough. I have a newborn, completely formula fed, which requires a lot more traveling items.

What do you think about the size of both bags?

bperry042 said...

Jenny,

I would go with the second bag. The "detour" diaper bag. The wasp bag is a purse size and I used it as an everyday purse. The diaper bag isn't overly large, but I was able to fit in tons of stuff for our son. And, even some extra things for our daughters when needed.