GADGETS
Soooo my six-year-old PowerBook had a bad bit of hard drive failure in the middle of May. I wasn't super distraught, as it was no longer my primary computer, but I do enjoy couch internet quite a bit and was looking to replace it. I was also looking to replace the six-year-old click wheel iPod I'd gotten at the same time as the Powerbook.
This ended with me buying an iPad to replace both. Whoops. All the cases I've found are sold out, prototypes, or things I don't really like. Sewing machine to the rescue: I threw together a simple soft sleeve in a couple of hours, just to keep it from getting damaged in my bag until something better (with a stand!!) comes along.
This metric system fabric is my greatest thrift score of all time.
Fleecy fabric inside to prevent scratching.
RED.
Red is not my color. Almost all my clothes are coooooool - blue, green, violet - I'm the ocean, look at me. So I have this dress in a fantastic mod print of all olive and mustard shades, and I was going to a wedding, and I needed some accessories. Red may not be my best all-over shade, but it's good here!
A small superquick clutch
It fit all the important stuff.
And I decided I should have a big red necklace, so I followed this tutorial and made my own:
stripey, patchy. clouds? no. tote bags!
I used the Quilted Garden Tote tutorial from Sew, Mama, Sew! to make this stripey, patchy tote for my mom.
Oh, it has been done
The bag has been finished.
(In the interest of full disclosure, it was NOT finished when this picture was taken; however the addition of the lining did not change its outward appearance!)
It's so heavy now that it's done, too! We did a bit of a test run today and used it as a fourth shopping bag on our grocery trip today. Being that the bottom didn't fall off when it was full, I think it's going to last a while. Huzzah.
So far-
Lately, I've been doing work on pieces for Wandering Alice. My day job has been busy and we've had social things to do too. So my for-me and for-etsy making has been a bit stalled. Unfortunate!
I've been working on the Amy Butler Weekender Travel Bag. It's going a bit slowly. I made the main side panels last week, and last night did the outside top part with the zipper. When I got to putting the pockets onto the top part, I made them upside down! Fool. Sooo.. I stopped there, and have to recut those pieces before I can move on.
Pattern sewing is not really my strength, but this bag will probably turn out all right.
Here's a shot of the finished sides. Woohoo for first-time piping!
GIGANTIC. Really. Huge.
I've also been working on going through stacks of paper and ephemera I've collected over the years. Instructional stuff and usable bits of stuff have been catalogued into manila envelopes, binders, and folders. The rest is newspaper clippings, printouts, and pictures which I've started taping into my current sketchbook.
I was doing some of that last week while watching Akira. Then I got sidetracked and drew a coelacanth.
Haha, living fossil!
Clutch
Our friends John and Gosia were getting married last month. I was wearing a dress that has an awesome mod print in shades of olive and mustard over off-white, but I had no appropriately sized purse to go with it. So, a few hours before the wedding, I threw together a little zippered clutch. Again, not perfect, but it fit my wallet, camera, phone, etc. It'll work well as a pencil case aside from that 
