My Latest Sewing Adventures

The latest instalment of Make Do and Mend in Dumbarton Library was slightly more straightforward.  Last week's was a tote bag, which I eagerly looked forward to making....until there were no written instructions.  I don't really function very well without a guide and, in the end, made a complete cock of it.  I sewed my handles on the wrong way.  You know, like a pair of dungarees rather than a bag?  Do you get me?  Am I alone in immediately losing interest in something when it isn't right?  One day I might unpick and redo but the moment has gone.  

Bored now.  Move on.  But yes, that IS a jammy dodger.  Well spotted, reader.

This week's task was.....a mobile phone cover to protect your phone when you drop it!  Hurrah!  I'm always dropping my phone and desperately needed a cover.  Excellent.  But wait.  I forgot.

I dropped my phone.

I shattered the screen and it had been sent to the menders the previous day and I had forgotten to take measurements. Perhaps I was grief-stricken; I do not function well without my phone.

Oops.

Ha HA!  A netbook cover was what was needed.  I don't drop my netbook quite as often as I drop my phone but some kind of protection would be a good idea.  It is my third (and cheapest) laptop since Flora was born, after all......

With Flora Flora Fabric Chooser, I made my cover with some denim material I had donated, and someone else's old top.  It was also donated, not just demanded at needle-point.  Turned out pretty nice in the end and I even tried my hand at a wee bit of machine quilting.  I know!  Me! 

So it's a little squint and the super-duper-practical-yet-decorative flap only really exists 'cos I cut the original material too short.  And I had to hand-sew (I typed that really slowly to emphasise the point) the whole thing together because the wadding made it too fat to join on the sewing machine, thus ensuring plenty of bad language and bloodstains (felt right at home in our library, fnar fnar).  I turned down the offer of a 'Handmade with Love' label.  It could never be anything else.

I like this set of workshops.  Mainly because they are free and we've been in really good company, but also because the biggest fear I have with sewing is not the sewing, but the cutting.  In the past, I've bought really beautiful material that's still in the cupboard because I lack the courage to cut it.  I am frightened of The Expensive Mistake.

The library received a lot of donated fabric; some of it is lovely to use, some horrendous, but because there is so much, there's not the same worry about making a mess of cutting it. So, I make mistakes and it's OK.  Even better, I learn how to avoid making those mistakes again.  Can you ask of anything more from a free workshop?

Laters

Luv Egg on a Stick x