Tote Bag

When Kyle bought my new sewing machine it came with a membership to the sewing/quilting store, including free monthly classes as well as discounts on fabric and supplies! Awesome! A friend from church had recently bought the same machine as mine, so we decided to take the February sewing class together. I couldn't wait to make something, so I decided we should do it on the earliest date available--February 2nd. :) The project this month is a tote bag. I looked at the pattern picture and the sample bag they had in the store and I wasn't totally sure I would love it, but I took the class anyway. I usually have a hard time picking out fabric. I'm way too indecisive and never know if I'm going to like the fabric once I sew it into something! But I found this red, white and black print at Joann's and thought it would be a good choice. Then I got a piece of marbled red to match, as well as some black.
The class was fun! It was pretty casual--just an open sewing time where the instructor would walk around and answer any questions or provide help when needed. The pattern was fairly easy to follow but, after the three hours were up, most of us still weren't finished. I packed up the pieces and worked at it a little bit here and there on Friday until I finally finished it! It was supposed to have a black pocket on the front and back but I changed my mind--didn't like how it looked with the red. I put one black pocket inside instead. And rather than have a flap/snap closure, I made ties. I may look for a couple big black wooden beads to tie on the ends later. Overall, I like how it turned out! It's cuter than I thought it would be. :)

My other recent sewing project was another pair of slippers for Parker. The blue flannel ones fit him really well but when I made them I wasn't thinking about our floors. We have tile. And I have since realized that flannel-covered, fast-moving little feet and smooth tile floors do not go well together! I don't like having to put his outside shoes on him when he's running around the tile part of the house, so I decided to make another pair of slippers, this time with non-skid soles. I found jiffy grip at Joanns and I had some knit fabric and fleece at home. The knit was actually a onsie! The last day he wore it was when he had a seizure. At some point it was cut off him by the paramedics because when we gathered up his clothes later that night, I picked up the onsie and this is what was left of it...

And it was only worn a couple times. Well, I loved the turtles so I threw it in my fabric pile and thought maybe I could use it for something later. Good thing I kept it! :)
I used the same pattern for these as I did for the blue pair. The only change was the non-skid bottom

Now Parker can run all he wants--even on the tile!