Tips from an Old Bag and Gerry K

As of a few weeks ago this was my purse (aka old bag). I've used it for years and love it.  

But it was starting to wear out. 

Boho bags were all the rage and a dear lady named Gerry K posted a tutorial on how she made hers and also sold some kits with fabric in her etsy store. 

So, I made a pattern of my old bag, bought some fabrics from Gerry and used some tips from her tutorial, added some of my own fabrics and some stitching and some thrift store finds and made myself a new purse. 

 The background of the flap was a doily from a thrift store, the fringe and beads I had in my stash, I had just learned how to make wide ribbon roses, and crocheted up a butterfly for the rose garden.

I had embroidered a rose on some taffeta thinking I would use it for a long purse strap but later decided it wouldn't work as a strap so turned it into a purse side. 

 This is part of the back of the purse. Fabrics are bonded together on interfacing ala Gerry's tutorial but I wanted to have some stitching on the purse too so I stitched.  The lace was in my stash so I painted it with alcohol ink. That was a first for me and quite possible a last.

This is the other side of the purse - again, I painted some lace and crocheted up a wild Irish rose.

 I added a piece of trim with whatever these little swivel thingys are called on the end to attach key rings and keys which seem to be absent. And, no, I really don't love NY - someone went there and brought it back to me thinking I would love a key ring with my name on it.

Since I am not good at pattern making I made the bag a little too loose on the inside so had to add some drawstrings in casing to keep all my stuff from falling out. But I kind of like what I did with my mistakes. It sat for months waiting for me to figure out what to do with a purse whose contents would spill out after all the work I had put into it.

I used up a lot of trims I had in my stash from thrift stores. 

 And I even made a coin purse with roses on it to go inside my new bag.

 When I was finished I took a couple of photos to try to showcase my work.

And I won second prize in a purse contest held on the CQI (Crazy Quilting International) Yahoo Group. Not sure what I won yet, but I do feel honored and I have a new purse besides. All the ladies at work love it and much to my surprise I've been offered some large (to me) sums of money for it. But, it's all mine!

I'm going over to the usual Tuesday linky party at Quilting by the River to show off.