Sweetly Gathered Round Hangbag


Hi sewing friends. Are you joining me for the Just for You Sewalong? We are sewing our way through the monthly chapters of Just for You: Selfish Sewing with Your Favorite SewCanShe Bloggers.  We just finished out January and I have a project share with you. Here's my Sweetly Gathered Round Hangbag!

This pattern from the book is designed by Delia Randall of Delia Creates. I love the style of it. And isn't this fabric dreamy? It's called Sinister Swarm Rayon Challis by Anna Maria Horner. The lining is Sunprint Arrows by Allison Glass.


These flexible handle hoops are made from brown faux-leather and they took A LOT of practice to make.

If you're making your handles too here are a few things I learned...
Make a practice handle! I can't stress this enough. I personally never want to spend more time on a project than I have to. But for this project your first handle will be a mess and your 2nd handle will look WAY better. You don't have to buy a third length of cording for your practice handle, just cut along your stitches and remove the vinyl from your 1st handle and use it for your third.

Be careful not to turn the edges under too much. This is easy to do. If you turn them under more than the recommended 1/4in there isn't enough room to sew, even with a zipper foot

Grease your vinyl with a swipe of sewing machine oil (usually comes with your machine). Spread a very thin layer on top of the vinyl along your sewing path. Wipe it off with a paper towel when you're done. I was so so amazed at what a difference this made. I think every machine handles sewing on vinyl differently. My last machine would always skip stitches on vinyl, this one just can't feed it through. But with the addition of just a little oil for lubrication it seriously sewed so much easier. See the difference in the photo below. These are my 2nd and 3rd handles I used the same stitch length on each of these handles. I cut the vinyl off the messy looking one and sewed up a new improved one to match. So, yes, I sewed 4 handles.

I haven't had a lot of sewing time over the last couple years, I just constantly get tugged and interrupted with all these kids running around and trying to be ready for the next part of our day. But, I'm determined to take more time to do the thing I love this year,sewing!.  So in order to accomplish this project I decided to break it down into doable steps and list them. I just worked on one part of the bag each night I got a chance to sit and sew. Sometimes I just got to sew 10 minutes at a time. "Baby steps" is my new sewing mantra. :) I can finish a project if I just do it in baby steps, even if I don't meet my deadline.


Anyway, I sure think it's pretty.


Come join our Facebook page and see what everyone else is making, Grab a book and sew along!

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