JoAnn’s had 60% off this fabric and as soon as I saw it I knew it needed to be mine. And it needed to be a skirt. For the holidays, of course. As kids, mom purchased new fancy dresses for my sister and I exactly twice a year – once for Christmas, and once for Easter. The Christmas ones were my favorite.

It’s been a while since I dressed up for the holidays. These last few years I’ve just worn jeans with a nice shirt, which isn’t bad or anything. But I miss those fancy outfits and having an excuse for dressing up. So, providing I don’t screw this up, I’ll pair this skirt up with a white tank, a colored cardigan (I’m thinking red, but I’ll have to see what looks better once the skirt is finished) and maybe make myself a little hair pin out of leftover fabric.

I’ve never worked with taffeta before. Hell, I’ve not really made a truly wear-able skirt before by a sewing pattern, either, with a proper waist band instead of elastic. So this will definitely be interesting, and challenging, and hopefully a totally rewarding experience. At least the fabric was reasonable, at $5.19/yard rather than the regular $12.99 price tag, so if I screw it up I’ll be disappointed but not furious at the huge waste of money.

The weekend’s sewing confidence boost led me to dig into my stash and whip up another pair of sleep pants. The gingham is thin, and not really practical for the cold winter. But I love them and will wear them all the same. I’ll be making a stop at JoAnns for some flannel for some proper winter sewing, but for now you can find me snuggling in these today with a hot cup of tea and my warm wool shawl and pondering what next I might try (a girl only needs so many PJ pants, after all!)

    $4 for 2 fat quarters
+ $2.50 for a magnetic snap
+ Barely anything for a few squares of fusible interfacing
+ Free pattern from Made By Rae
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Cute new spring purse for less than $7

My current purse (a store-purchased one) is getting pretty beat up and ugly. Rather than buy another one I figured I’d just sew myself one. I’ve toyed with making bags in the past, but I’m still far from great at them.

This one had some mistakes (like cutting the fabric the wrong way and having to improvise the strap), and I probably should have done the top stitching across the edge of the bag and the straps a little closer than I did. It was my first time using fusible interfacing, and my first time using magnetic snaps as well. I think, on my next bag, I’ll use the interfacing on the entire bag and not just where the snaps go to make it a bit more sturdy overall. But for this size bag, two layers of fabric seem to be sturdy enough.

It’s a bit smaller than I usually carry. I knew it would be a small bag when I decided to make it. After all, you can’t get much from 2 fat quarters. The outside fabric immediately drew my attention when I saw it in the store – deciding on the inside fabric was the hard part. This fabric has so many colors on it that a nice solid color would have been ok. But I wanted something different – something fun/funky. I mean, I’m the one that has to see it day in and day out, so why not? And then I found this charcoal/white zebra print and I knew I had to have it.

Overall, I’m pretty damn pleased with myself and my new bag. I purchased the patterns for Daphne, Ava Rose, and the Market Bag from Artsy Crafty Babe yesterday so I do believe I’ll be trying my hand at one of those later this weekend or maybe the next. I’ve been eyeing her patterns for so long and finally sucked it up and purchased them. We’ll see how I do with one of those patterns now that I have some new skills/knowledge under my belt.