The Girl Who Received the Purse I Made

If you recall, I mentioned that Sew Powerful was doing a fundraiser for 20 people (which they opened it up to some more and had 39 total people participate) to have the purse that they made to be hand delivered to one of the girls in Zambia and that we would get a photo taken of the girl who received our purse. The team just got back from the trip, so we will be receiving a photo in the mail in a couple of weeks, but we were also emailed the photo so we could see it now.

This is the girl who received the purse I made. I was thrilled to see a girl with a purse that I made and this was the next best thing to going to Zambia and giving some purses to girls myself. A few of the others have posted the photos of the girls holding their purses on the Sew Powerful Facebook page too. I hope the rest of them share their photos too. 

When you sew for charity, rarely do you ever get any feedback from the recipient. I have never seen a photo or heard anything from the person who received the item (a quilt or purse) that I have made. I certainly don't expect to see or hear anything, but it would be awesome just to know what that person thought. Those volunteers who hand out such items hear so many wonderful things, but those words never get back to the maker. So to finally make a connection and see the girl who got one of my purses means so much to me! I am sure that she wonders about me who made the purse as well?

I do know her first name, but will not share it here. I will think of her and all her classmates now and in the future as I continue to sew purses to donate to this wonderful charity that helps keep the girls in school all month, every month to better themselves with an education. There are millions of girls each year waiting for a purse, won't you help by sewing some purses or making a donation to Sew Powerful to help fill the purses with the needed hygiene supplies? 

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Sew Powerful Purses #63-79 (17 more purses)

I have lots of purse kits cut out ready to sew when I want to sew. Over the Memorial Day weekend I finished up these purses, most were in reds or reds and blues, so perfect color choice for the holiday. 

The purses with the red, white and blue plaid print has a bit of a waffle texture like a kitchen towel, so those purses made really sturdy purses. That fabric was a donation fabric, in fact most of the fabrics I used in these purses were donated, except for a few of the scraps.

Flap lining with label I add to all the purses I make.

I don't know why some of the photos get out of order when I add them to my blog posts😕. This is a closeup of the translucent button for the purse that is below the next purse below. Just too much work to have to delete and add photos again in the proper order 😜I love how you can see the star print through this button.

This is purse with the translucent button I showed a closeup of 2 photos above.

I had some small cowboy/Southwest panels on a large fabric, so I cut out this hat and made the flap.

Another photo out of order 😛! Two photos below shows the purse front. I wanted to show the back pocket I added to this purse and some of the others I did add a pocket as well, if I had enough fabric to do so.

The flap lining belonging to the purse below.

This was another small panel from that fabric cut the cowboy/cowgirl hat out of. There are a few different horses on that fabric of panels and some hats, boots, bison, cattle too. I don't I will use the horses on more purses, but probably not the bison or cattle or even the cowboy on a horse, as those aren't very girly looking.

I didn't have any more fabric for a back pocket so I added a blue fabric instead. The front of the purse is below.

I tried using scraps to make a wonky star and this was the best one I made, but still not great. After adding fabrics around it though it turned out to be a nice purse flap.

The back side of the the purse below and the back side of the fabric heart notecard that I have enclosed in the purse. I made hundreds of these notecards last year and just finished the remaining ones I had. Those were a lot of work to make, so rethinking how or if I will make more notecards. Other people make just notecards, so might have them make the notecards when I use up the rest of the paper cards I am stamping now. That stamping was supposed to save me time, but that seems to take even more time than sewing!😄

This is the front of the purse and notecard from above photo.

Back of purse with added pocket. Front is below.

Here is the front side of the purse.

This flap was made with the leftover scraps I had after making a custom tote last year.

 

I have more purses I finished that I will share soon. Plus, I am sewing more too. Until next time...

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Cork Mini Wallet + Sale

This is the Cork (or vinyl) Mini Wallet. Such a super fast little project to sew, using a scrap of cork, or vinyl. You can use this wallet in the Essential Phone Bag (previous bag I posted) or use it in any bag or alone, and be sure to scroll to end of this post for the SALE code for all the Around the Bobbin patterns too.

The Cork Mini Wallet measures 4" high x 2.5" wide and has a mesh pocket on each side of the wallet. Pop in your ID, credit card, cash and go. These would make super fast gifts and a great way to use up small vinyl or cork scraps.

One side here.

The other side here.

I popped in my card so you can see how you can see through the mesh.

Not only is this pdf pattern on sale, but all of Around the Bobbin's patterns are on SALE on the website for 15% off! Use Code ATBSALE to get the 15% discount. Sale valid May 24-27th. So grab all the patterns you have been wanting to sew while they are on sale.😉

Also, check out the other testers versions here, for the Essential Phone Bag & the Cork Mini Wallet.

Happy Sewing!

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Essential Phone Bag by Around the Bobbin + SALE

This was a fun and quick little bag to make. The Essential Phone Bag by Around the Bobbin is a minimalist style cross body bag that will hold a phone, and a few other essentials, like keys, or a little wallet like the Mini Cork Wallet (see next post about this wallet). The bag closes with a magnetic snap and has a pocket on the front. It is lightweight and perfect when you don't need to carry a lot with you. The cross body style is an easy style to wear and no more aching shoulders from carrying a too heavy larger bag. I hear that from a lot of women how they cannot carry larger bags anymore as it is too much stress on their shoulders, so The Essential Phone Bag is a great choice to wear and use.

Finished bag measures 7" high x 4.5" wide.

I used all one fabric for this bag (batik fabric), but you could make it with a different fabric for the flap as well.

The lining fabric is a hand dyed fabric.

Here is the main compartment and the front slip pocket.

Back of the bag.

These are quick and easy to make and would make great gifts!

Not only is this pdf pattern on sale, but all of Around the Bobbin's patterns are on SALE on the website for 15% off! Use Code ATBSALE to get the 15% discount. Sale valid May 24-27th. So grab all the patterns you have been wanting to sew while they are on sale.😉

Also, check out the other testers versions here.

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Giant Pink Heart Quilt

I can finally share this quilt because it was received yesterday. I have been email pen pals with a young woman who is a wife and mother of young children, for about 3 months now. I won't tell you much other than to say she has a lot of stuff going on in her life and I felt compelled to do something for her, so what does a quilter do? Makes a quilt 😄! But rather than just send her a quilt, I got the idea to fill the box full of other sewing/quilting tools, patterns, fabric, handmade bags an baskets, etc. My friend, Julie gave me some things to help put in the box too. She was touched and loved the quilt (I am so happy about that) and all the other things too. So it made my day to help brighten her day! I let Julie know and she was pleased too.

She loves the color pink and I had seen this quilt online and wanted to make it, but I didn't have any larger floral prints like Kaffe Fasset designs, so I chose batik fabrics as I do have batiks. The look is a little different in batik fabrics. I had seen photos of several colorways of this quilt made and each colorway gave it a different look. I only saw kits sold and I wanted to use fabrics I had and not buy a kit. It was easy enough to make since it is squares and rectangles that make up the pinwheel-looking blocks. I just decided on the size square and went from there. It came out pretty large, 65" wide x 70" high. 

My Favorite Quilt Store sells the kits in a variety of colorways. Tickled Pink was one colorway that you can see here. If you scroll down in the link above, you will see other colorways and if you then use the right arrow to click on, you will see even more colorways. See how different the colors can change the look of this quilt? I do love Kaffe fabrics. Better use up what I have first before I go buying any more fabric though!

I called this Giant Pink Heart Quilt as I didn't know what else to name it😂! When my daughter was a little girl she named her stuff bear, Baby Bear. She had another bear she called Brown Bear. One doll was Big Doll, while her baby doll was, Baby Doll. Such original names! Ha!

Serpentine quilting stitch.

I used soft flannel for the back and used 2 flannel colors as I didn't have enough of either color that was large enough,

I quilted it trying to follow the direction of the  heart shape.

I need to start making a few more quilts to put into the gift shop as all the larger ones sold! I have 2 small wall dog quilts in the shop, but they are about placemat size. Funny how I couldn't sell the larger quilts years ago, only the small wall quilts. Now it has shifted to where the larger baby/lap size ones are selling. Who knows why? The good thing about making those larger quilts is that I can donate what doesn't sell. If those dogs don't sell, I might just sew them onto a quilt!

Happy quilt making or quilt snuggling! Hugs to you Samantha!!!

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Eleven Portable Pockets (Small-Medium-Large) Zipper Pouches

I made eleven more Portable Pockets in Small-Medium & Large, depending on the amount of fabric I had left in each print I had. I think these zipper pouches are so handy and because they come in 3 sizes, they are great to make in any size you might need. I tested this pattern before it was released from Around the Bobbin over a year and a half ago.

I took a S-M-L (plus 2 more Medium sizes) to the gift shop to see if they would sell a couple of months ago and one of each size sold. So I then took these in and they accepted all eleven of them. I sold 2 small sizes, but not sure which ones as they group them by size. I thought the medium might be the best seller, but so far it looks like the small is. Maybe because it is priced less? Or maybe people like the smaller size? Who knows? I hope the other 9 sell and the other 2 medium I had in the shop when I brought these in will also sell, but time will tell. All were made in a variety of Southwest print fabrics.

Here are 2 in size large in 2 different Southwest Prints.

Here are 4 medium size pouches in 3 different Southwest prints. Somehow I put the mesh on the zippered pocket side of the lower right hand pouch. It looks fine, so I left it.

The mesh side has the pocket divided into 2 mesh pockets.

Medium and large sizes showing the divided mesh pockets. I put a little paper inside saying that this is a Portable Pocket and the size it is.

Medium and larges sizes from the zipper pocket side.

Set of 3 (s-m-l) in the same Southwest print.

5 small size pouches from the mesh pocket side. The small have a snap instead of a divided pocket as these are just too small to divide (in my opinion).

5 small sizes from the zipper pocket side. I know 2 of these sold, but I wonder which 2?

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