Rainy Day Tote

Today I was stitching this Martha Pullen design for a work sample. It's a canvas bag lined with nylon and has a matching umbrella holder. I'd never sewn with canvas before and found it a little challenging. A size 14 topstitch needle helped a lot, but I missed being able to press a sharp crease.

When sewing the nylon lining I used a size 8 microtex sharp. I was reflecting about how much more complicated my sewing has become, often frequently changing both needles and feet. I can remember using the same needle and foot for all my sewing and being quite happy about it.

I worked on another project that I won't be able to finish by tomorrow's deadline, both because I messed up and had to start over and also because it's time-consuming. I turned instead to doing some studio clean-up, long over due. Somewhere along the line I'd dropped both my snips and small spool cap and they'd promptly disappeared. I have to have at least two of each to function nicely.

While cleaning, I found a UFO in a tote, lost since my move. It's not going to work in its present state, it looks like I started free motion quilting it back in the day when I was new at it. Luckily there isn't too much stitching and it isn't very good, so I'll easily be able to snip it out from the back. See, gotta have those snips. Then I'll probably cut it up and add more piecing.

Somewhere along the line, I've become quite happy with cutting up my quilts and giving them a different life. It was hard to do at first, taking a scissors or rotary cutter to all that work. Now I'm eager to see how the piece can change.