Bag-making day

Ran around fretting first thing this morning, because I couldn’t reach either the Contra Costa News Register or the West County Times to publish my FBN. Wrote my morning pages in a brand-new book (well, a repurposed 1997 dayplanner I salvaged from Erik’s parents’ house!), and calmed down. Later called both papers again and left messages, and this time a nice woman from the West County Times called me back immediately with details and instructions. I emailed her the form, gave her my credit card number over the phone, and checked that off my to-do list! And just in time, too… the deadline to publish is this Sunday. What would happen if I didn’t publish it by then, who knows? Probably nothing, but I’m such a goody-goody I hate the thought of being illegal. Which reminds me, I should call the zoning office and make sure I’m cleared to work from home… my distaste for illegal activity battles with my total abhorrence of talking to strangers on the phone (a feeling which I recently learned is shared by Bright)!

Felt much better, even buoyant, after getting the FBN business taken care of. Finished the first quilt-squares bag from yesterday (see previous entry), then finished the second one and listed it on Etsy.

I’d lined the first bag with unbleached muslin, which is the cheapest and easiest fabric to work with, but for this one I wanted a richer look, so I chose one of Anjali’s silk saris, a beautiful gold print. I think this particular sari is actually silk charmeuse, which is probably one of the trickiest fabrics to work with (I don’t know if I’ll ever have the guts to attempt a garment from it!), but the gold goes so well with the exterior fabrics, and it’s so luxurious as a lining. I laid out a layer of muslin first, then put the silk on top of it and the flat unfinished bag on top of that, and cut out the lining with little trouble. Then I pinned the silk to the muslin — twice, because I’d originally laid the silk down wrong-side-up and then realized my mistake and had to switch to right-side-up — and then folded the edges over and stitched them. This wasn’t hard, thanks to the pinning, but the two fabrics went through the feed dogs at different rates (at least I think that’s what happened), so the finished lining ended up a little puckery along the seams… which actually ends up just fine for the bag, since the silk is so billowy anyway, you can’t tell. And since it’s just the lining, and it’s kind of an odd-shaped bag anyway, I have some wiggle room as to how big the lining has to be, and how exactly it should match up to the exterior. But sewing with silk is definitely a challenge, and not to be taken lightly!

Before I did this bag, I was worried the lining would be too heavy, with the double layer of silk and muslin, but it was fine because both fabrics are so lightweight. I’m wondering now whether I should always back the saris with muslin.

Anyway, I’m just delighted with how the bag came out. I took many many photos of it, and tried to take some of me carrying it, but those didn’t work so well. I still need to figure out how to deal with items that should be modeled. It’s really tricky when it’s just me and the self-timer… if I had a proper tripod it might be easier, but it’d still probably be a bit of a pain. I need a hot girl roommate who will model for me at a few hours’ notice!! (Erik doesn’t accurately represent my target audience. ;b)

I also updated all my other tote listings with photos of the bags with Mousemarket‘s adorable satsuma charms tied on. That took kind of a long time, but I’m glad it’s done now.

Off to drawing studio! It’s the last one of the term.