Miss Independent Bag

What a sewing adventure I had this week. A year or so ago I was blessed with a free copy of Big City Bags  from Sara Lawson of sewsweetness.com. Craftsy was a having a giveaway of her new book and I was the lucky winner.

Almost every bag in this book caught my eye and I want to sew all of them but The Miss Independent Bag stood out. Here's a pic from the book.

When I saw this bag I fell in love. I immediately knew I had to make this bag to hold all my planners and accessories case. Here's how mine turned out.

Making this bag was a little challenging for me. I never used so many interfacings together in my life! But I love how sturdy it turned out. Now sewing the bias tape was the biggest challenge. Having to maneuver the bag around the sewing machine was tricky but I got it done. This bag took me about 4 days to make. Yikes!!

I made a few changes on mine. I didn't sew the outer pockets on the bag. Truth be told I ran out of interfacing and I didn't want to go out and buy more. It's way too hot!! As you can see the bag from the book is shaped a little different than mine. I decided I wanted my bag to be more rectangle. I don't remember why I decided to do that but I did. Also the pattern asks for ready made leather handles. The handles that I found where way to expensive so I made them instead. I used 1" webbing and made them at about 26" long.  I love the way the webbing handles gives it a beach bag feel. I also made the laptop case for it. I didn't square off the bottom like in the book because I'm not using it for a laptop. I'm using it for my journal and journal supplies. And here's a pic with everything in it.

Everything fits perfectly! Now I don't have stay in one place while working on my planner or journal. I can just pick it up and carry it to any room . Or beach. :)