Several years ago I belonged to a bag-making club - each month I was sent a pattern by various designers, along with fabrics and bits and bobs to complete each bag. This particular kit, Sunrise by Melly and Me, was still sitting in a box, just waiting for the right person to make it for. Then along comes a special girl who loves bags and when she saw the collection of them in my sewing room a few weeks ago, she almost squealed with delight when I said I'd make one especially for her! This kit contained the fabrics to make both the bag and the purse, along with a zipper and a set of self-cover buttons. These buttons were really easy to make, and I was able to fussy-cut some of the feature fabric from a few leftover scraps once the main parts for the bag were cut and sewn together...
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...the pattern was super easy to follow and the bag was really simple to put together. I used Vliseline H630 for the wadding which was fused to the wrong side of the bag front and back, after the 2 panels were joined but before the pleats were added. If I made the pattern again, I'd also fuse wadding the wrong side of the linning too to give it a bit more structure. The purse was even simpler to construct as it was made with a series of rectangles and squares, stitched together very simply. The purse lining was also backed with Vlieseline H630 and a lightweight interfacing was fused to the wrong side of all the pockets. There's a coin pocket with a zipper fastening, along with a pocket for notes and a few smaller pockets for cards. All of these pockets are neatly topstitched....
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...I've added a pale blue ribbon to the zipper pull on the coin pocket. Velcro is stitched in place on both the front of the purse and on the wrong side of the tab to keep the purse closed. Another pretty fussy-cut self-covered button is stitched to the front of the tab for decoration...
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...inside this simple slouch-style bag there's also a shaped slip-pocket. The bag itself is quite roomy, and neatly spaced pleats are stitched along the front and back of both the bag and the lining. The lower edge is gathered to give this bag a nice shape. The purse also has similar pleats along the front and back...
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...and here is the completed Sunshine bag with matching purse, perfect for a young girl to take shopping! The fussy-cut self-covered buttons were stitched in place to decorate the handles, and add a nice finishing touch to this bag. Now it just needs to be wrapped and gifted!
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