Hi there!
Today I would like to show you some purses I made recently. They are all gifts for my lovely Mom. She likes to sew as well and some time in January she actually sent me a package with seven (yes, that is 7!!) skirts she made for me. I thought that was very sweet and it was about time to make some things for her. I already made a small purse for her last year before I went home for a visit and she liked it a lot- well, both of it, the purse as well as me visiting :)
So I decided to make two more of these, but I changed them a little bit:

I basically used my Mini travel sleeve tutorial, but made these purses a little wider. The front pocket is divided, so that she can fit credit cards into either compartment. The main compartment is for her smartphone and bank notes.

I also added a zipper pocket to the back of both purses since in Germany people use a lot more cash and you always end up with lots of coins (also because there are 1-Euro and 2-Euro coins, not bank notes... I always disliked how all those coins added weight to my wallet). One of the purses is made of gray, black and white colored fabrics, so I added a little color to it with the turquoise zipper.

Mama also mentioned some time ago that she would like to have a small to medium-sized handbag in green shades. So I came up with this one:

She told me that she would love for the bag to have a zipper pocket on the inside, a compartment for her phone and an adjustable strap. Easily done :)

I also added a swivel clip to the inside, so she can clip on her wallet, her keys or her foldable shopping tote.
I hope my mom is going to like her new purses. And as luck would have it my husband is going to Germany tomorrow for business, but he will be able to stop by at my parents' place for one day and bring my mum her purses.

I am glad I was able to finish everything in time. In my next blogpost I will show you the new bag I made for my husband. He had the crazy, last-minute idea that it would be nice to travel to Germany with a new bag (that sounds so much like me! I think my behavior is rubbing off on him - ALWAYS travel with a new bag LOL!), so I had a make-it-work moment on the weekend.
I hope you all had a nice Easter weekend and found some spare time for sewing :)

Hello everybody!
It's been a while since I have last posted but I was out of town and exploring my new country again. And to be quite honest, I was totally sick of the looooong winter of upstate NY, so I escaped to California for a little bit. One of the most awesome things I did was this:
Shopping at Mood Fabrics, Los Angeles!
I love love love this store and you might remember that I went to the store in New York City for the first time, in December of last year. I knew that if I ever make it to Los Angeles I would have to go to the store there. And so I did, on April 2, to be exact!

The store is located at 645 South La Brea Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90036. It is smaller than the one in NYC but just as well organized! And to be honest, there is still so much fabric to choose from, it gets a little overwhelming. One half of the store has all the fashion fabrics and the other half all the home decor fabrics. I spent about two hours in the store and left with four fabrics.

There is also a huge collection of buttons, buckles, zippers and all other supplies you can possibly think of. I mean look at the picture with all the buttons! Isn't that amazing??

And these are the fabrics I bought:
I started off in the knit section since I love nice cotton knits with prints and they are just so hard to get. This one is definitely going to be made into another summer dress, like the one I already made a couple weeks ago, with the Rochester skyline on the back. I even found this fabric online on the Mood Fabrics website, if you want to check it out.

I also bought this knit fabric with a large scale print:

My favorite is this next one! I was looking for a fabric to make a maxidress using a Burda style pattern and I found this awesome silk fabric:

This is the pattern I want to use. I haven't tried this one before but I think it will look really gorgeous with that fabric. I just hope I won't screw up on this one because I could not forgive myself if I did :)
If you are interested in this pattern, it is in the Burda style May 2013 edition and you can also find it on their website.

This is the last fabric I bought. I am not really sure what I am going to make of this one but I kind of liked the color combo. I could make it into a skirt for instance and it will match a lot of my tops. It is a Marc Jacobs fabric for $ 18/yard, so I couldn't resist.

I hope you enjoyed looking at my new fabrics! I know I do. If you ever make it to LA or NYC you have to check out Mood Fabrics. It is seriously one of the most exciting fabric stores I have ever been to (and that includes stores in Europe). I have been to both of them within four months and couldn't be more excited about it. I hope to be able to go back some time...