Yay for spring! I was getting SO TIRED of snow. Jeff did a ton of work out in the garden yesterday after work and filled eleven (11!) big leaf bags for collection this morning. Looks like the ice will be going out on Canoe Lake any day now. Looks like my prediction of May 4th in the annual ice-out poll is going to be way off.

I made the cute little handbag above on my sewing machine last night; I got the pattern from Sew Everything Workshop by Diana Rupp. I used some of the fabric I bought at FilKONtario.

Anyway, I'm going to modify the pattern to make the bag deeper and with a longer handle that I can sling over my shoulder; I'm not really the 'cute little handbag' type, but wanted to try the pattern to see how it worked.

It was SUPER easy even though it required lining, and was so fun to do that I may eventually make some more to sell in my Etsy shop. The project requires something called a French seam, which sounds a lot more complicated than it is. You use it for the bottom of the bag, and basically requires you to turn the bag inside out twice, sewing the bottom seam each time. The second sewing hides the first seam. Very cool technique.

Of course, I still managed to sew the lining on the wrong side of the fabric the first time and had to unpick all the sewing, but at least I'm getting faster with the seam ripper after all this experience. :-)

Using my fancypants GPS-enabled pedomeer, I found out that the walk to and from our neighbourhood sewing supplies shop is about 4.6 km. It's one of my regular walks; not only is it good exercise, but it gives me an excuse to ogle sewing stuff. Yesterday I bought a snap fastener for the handbag; I'll be sewing that on tonight.

Above: one of my mom-in-law's cats after a particularly exhausting session on the Wii.

Getting together with Allison and Jodi tonight to do prep for our gig at Balticon in Baltimore, Maryland at the end of next month. So far it looks as if we'll be doing a concert, round-robin children's concert, a music workshop, and a literary theme filk. I'll also be participating in at least one comics panel.

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