The Purse

First of all: I think my blog has gone slightly deranged on me.

I made a purse as a Christmas Present for my MIL. I hate the danged thing. I'm not a big fan of camels, or anything, but we saw this pattern in JCS in Sept? or something and it looked like her. And it looked cute and easy, because I'm a whole-hearted idiot.

For the stitchers: Pattern is on the cover of JCS October 2004, Desert Safari by Marie Barber, and the pattern was done on Lambswool Linen, because I have a slight addiction to the stuff.

I finished it at 11 pm last night. I actually finished the stitching on Friday (I think? Maybe Saturday?) The stitching was easy, though, so that wasn't the issue. The issue was the purse. And the fringe. OMG the Fringe.

I ordered the premade purse online (because I'm stupid, it was a really simple pattern to sew, and I can't sew much, but it did save me time, so I guess I should just be quiet about that), but I didn't like the cording and fringe and handles offered, so I figured I'd hit those locally.

And here it is:

HOW TO MAKE A PURSE,

By Suz

1. Stitch pattern
2. Triple serge the material for the lacing because you rock, and you are a crazy damn good lacer. This is a purse, people, not an heirloom wall hanging. Lace it for all you are worth.
3. Finish onto padded foamform thing that you bought online. Easy. Anyone who stitches and is used to lacing can do that (even though the instructions aren't clear about lacing, *any* experienced stitcher will have it in a flash, and I did
4. Hand-sew on the cording. Scream and cuss at stitching into cardboard because you are an idiot proud of your work who thinks that secure is good. Like I said: purse.
5. Be REALLY stupid and go to Hobby Snobby. Buy three kinds of fringe because you don't know which one you like best. Then after deciding which one you want to put on, do something REALLY stupid, like decide that all three would look great. Yeah, that was smart
6. Machine sew three kinds of fringe together, because while you're stupid enough to think three kinds of fringe will look great, you are SMART enough to realize that hand sewing three kinds of separate fringe will give you screaming hissy fits faster than anything known to mankind
7. Hand sew fringe to padded thingamabobber. Swear. A lot. Enough to scare the dog. And the ferts. And they've heard swearing a lot.
8. Sew padded thingamabobber with cord and lots of fluffy in the way to the purse. Keep swearing, it's therapeutic.
9. Sew the first purse handle by hand.
10. Get smart and realize that the free purse handle (aka: side without all of that stuff) can be machine sewed instead of hand sewed.
11. Sew little sides closed
12. Take picture as proof
13. Wrap that puppy so you don't have to look at it for the next 5 days
14. Look longingly back at afghan/babyblanket being crochet because crocheting doesn't cause cussing in quite the same way.

Officially: Christmas is DONE. The Amazon.com box came in the other day. Everything is wrapped, MIL's gift is officially now done. Stick a fork in me, I'm done, too.