It’s a Process!

I love, no that’s a lie, let’s start again lol…. I dislike when people ask me, “how long did it take you to make that bag?” Now, do I dislike it because I think they’re being rude, don’t they understand that you can’t talk about art and how many hours it takes to create?!? Not at all lol, I dislike it because I have no clue how to answer it, and maybe also because if I admit how many hours I actually think it takes, that they’ll be shocked that it takes me that long lol!!

For most projects, there is a whole process that begins way before we actually sit down at our sewing machines. Some people hate this part, they just want to get to the sewing part. Me? It’s one of my favourite parts of a project, although I do think I have a tendency to make it harder than it needs to be, something I’m trying to work on!

So that’s what I wanted to chat about today, my process and how I meander my way through it so I can, indeed, end up at my beloved Juki ready to go!

How I decide what I’m going to sew isn’t always easy, unless it’s becsuse of a pattern I’ve seen and feel like I would like to make it! That’s the best and easiest way to start, and if, for some reason, it’s not something I can start right then and there, I will just add the pattern to my “To Make” list for later on. Sometimes I’ll buy the pattern right then though, just so I’ll have it for when I am ready…however, this is also something I’ve been trying to change because it’s a slippery slope to just becoming a “pattern collector”! Since 95% of the patterns I buy are PDF’s, I can purchase them and download them in a matter of minutes so when I decide I’m going to actually make a certain pattern, I can be started within minutes! There’s one exception to this rule, and that’s if the pattern is on sale, then I have to reevaluate lol! And before you come at me and say that the patterns deserve to be purchased at full price, I agree, and I do purchase lots of them at full price BUTTTTTTT our Canadian dollar doesn’t do so well against other currencies so sometimes the only way I can afford a pattern is when it’s on sale!!! Ok, moving on!

Now in some cases, I’m led by a fabric! Sometimes we get in a fabric that speaks to me, no, YELLS at me that I must simply buy it, I’m basically helpless against it. Thankfully I’m pretty self-regulated in this area, I have to be pretty certain  of how I’m going to use it before I’ll actually buy it. That’s how I’ve always been, that’s nothing new for me. Having a huge stash of fabric makes me feel wasteful and overwhelmed….and let me say here that I don’t judge anyone on their stash, to each their own!

This last scenario is what happened recently to me when we got this new line of fabric in called Another Dimension by Studio E:

They were yelling SHAWNA BUY ME at the top of their lungs, so I obliged lol! Before I fully commited though, I took the time to think about what I would like to make, and again, this is my usual process because I want to make sure I buy enough yardage, but also not so much that I’ll have lots of leftovers. Thankfully this never takes me too long, somehow I look at the fabric and it almost just kind of comes to me….and in this case, I knew I wanted to make myself a laptop bag, something that I’ve wanted to make for ages and just never got around to it.. maybe I was waiting for the right fabric lol!!!

I went ahead and made my purchase, a yard of the focal fabric, the Turquoise Floral and a 1/2 yard each of the Colourfup Waves and the Silver Hexagons. In this case, I had previously purchased the pattern I wanted to use, the Lupin Laptop Bag by Blue Calla Patterns, which is one of my favourite bag designers and one of the best designers, in my humble opinion!

Ok, we’re rolling right along here! Pattern has been selected, fabrics that need to be purchased have been purchased, all that’s left to do is pick out coordinating fabrics, which in this case will be vinyl or cork, both of which I already have in my stash. And this is what that looks like for me….

I go through and pull out anything that at first glance, appears to match, and then I set it all up like this, which makes it super easy for me to make eliminations. Sometimes I choose one and then it turns out I don’t have enough yardage, so it gets pulled out too. I store my vinyls/cork rolled so I can’t see how much I have until I open it up, and you might think I could just label them with how much there is in the roll but I keep every scrap of these so trying to measure it all woukd be a nightmare! With cork and vinyl, you can usually get very creative how you lay your pattern pieces in order to have as little waste as possible, hence why I keep everything lol!

For the Lupin, I knew I would use the floral for the majority of the exterior and then the hexagon and wave prints for the exterior. That meant I needed two vinyl/cork for the accent pieces. One of my choices wasn’t quite long enough in one piece so I’ll have to sew 2 pieces together, but I think/hope it’ll be fine!

Very seldom do I make handles for bags, I fully embrace using webbing for them which cuts down on time and fabric requirements, 2 wins there lol! Next up is hardware and zippers. I try to keep a small selection of different sizes of hardware on hand because that is something I use often. This bag requires some 1.5″ items that I didn’t have, as well as I’m making a slight change to how the crossbody strap attaches so I had to make a small order for those things through our supplier, and they’ll arrive within a week. Zippers are pretty a pretty quick and easy selection as I don’t have a huge selection to choose from. I usually lean towards basic colours as I want the zipper to be pretty obviously but not the main focal point.

I did it! I made it through the hardest parts that I was talking about! Sometimes these choices are the things that lock me up! I pick something and then second guess my choice. Maybe this one is better? Or this one? Should I just buy something else that would be a better match? NOOOOO SHAWNA lol! That’s literally what I say to myself, and this is what I’m working on. I’m trying to just go with my first choice and move on! As soon as I make that first choice, and I’ve seen that I have enough yardage, I quickly put all the other options away and move on to the next task! It’s been working well for me the last few projects so yay me lol!

At this point, it’s time to actually start following the pattern instructions, which means cutting and interfacing….and here’s where I’m going to give you my biggest time saving tip, it’s nothing I came up with personally, I’m not even 100% sure where I learned it but I did and I thank the genius person every single time I do it!

If I need to apply interfacing to my fabric, for example SF 101, I apply it to my entire piece of fabric and then cut out the required pattern pieces! This means I’m only having to cut out one pattern piece instead of cutting one out of cotton and one out of interfacing and then ironing on the interfacing!!!!! I’m telling you, it cuts down significantly on your prep time! This also prevents your pattern pieces from having any shrinkage because you’re not cutting them out till after you’ve adhered them, which I when the shrinkage can occur! Genius!!!

Once interfacing is done, I’m pretty much ready to get started EXCEPT I do one thing differently than most patterns…my Step 1 is to do my straps first!! Designers usually put this as the last step but I find that by the time I finish sewing the actual bag, I kind of want to be done with the whole thing, so if I’ve already done the strap, I truly am done lol!!

And that friends, is my process…and let me tell you, typing all that is almost as long as the process itself lol! But seriously, typing all that shows me in black and white just some of the time and effort I put into a project so next time someone asks me the dreaded question, I can proudly say “so many hours and it’sall worth it” lol!

I wanted to share this with you because maybe something I do can help you, and if you do something it may help me! Sharing is caring!

You may have noticed that I didn’t tell you which vinyl/cork I chose to use, and I did that on purpose! I want to keep a little mystery till next week when I share my co pleted bag but also I’m curious if you’d choose the same ones I did! I numbered them on the pic below so you  an easily tell me what your 2 choices are ..and go!

Wishing you all an amazing week, hopefully spring is spring-ing where you are and you  an find some time to enjoy it! Thanks for being here!

Shawna