Coming down the home stretch & keeping busy

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T-minus one week until the movers will have our house boxed up into a monster moving van driving down to Florida!! I am beyond excited, but my nerves are shot. My mind goes through many mental lists wondering if there is anything I have forgotten to do. Thankfully, with the house sold all those complications are out of the way and now I fret over getting the kids and their school transcripts, physicals, etc. ready to go. If you’ve moved with a gaggle of kids, you feel my pain.

I have been keeping my mind and body busy with things other than moving. I head into my studio often and find myself working on small projects. If I have ideas for larger bags I find myself getting out my sketchpad and jotting them down. I just can’t jump into a larger bag project right now…..but boy do I have some great ideas in my sketchbook!

I may have mentioned a time or two that I love foreign handbag design and patterns. I have found myself the owner of two Japanese design books (handbags of course!) and will pour over them in the carpool line. Too bad I can’t read a lick of it. If you are an experienced sewist, you can find your way through the well detailed diagrams, but sometimes even that is difficult.

See the picture above? I found this on one of many foreign sites I read daily. With the help of Google Translate, I was able to get accurate measurement and give this little coin pouch a try.  The pictures make it look larger, but boy is this sucker small. Maybe 4 inches tall completed. TINY! It was actually not too difficult to make and when I doubled the measurements and made it again it looked much better. The bigger pouch could easily be used for make-up, money, receipts, etc. I will play around with this pattern some more and see what happens.

If you have some time to check out this website I encourage you to do so SEWLOVER. You will need Google Translate to surf around, but if you are a die-hard crafter you will thoroughly enjoy yourself.  The skill and talent of these crafters blow me away. And their willingness to share them on the www is even better!  I am always searching for new techniques or crafty things to learn, so this site fits the bill.  Enjoy!

 

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4 Comments

  1. Hi, I’m definitely going to check it out. I’ve never used google translate before either. Thank for the tip and goodluck with the big move!
    Janelle

  2. Hi Cindy, I have a few Japanese purse making books as well that I really like. The seem to have a lot of great patterns. I used google translate in the pass but because I never downloaded it to my computer it is no longer available they stopped it in Nov. I haven’t figured out a new translate yet. So I just keep hitting buttons, something will pop up that I can figure out. You must be so happy to all be back in the same house after the move. Good Luck with the move.
    Natalie

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