New Projects and bag instructions

Firstly a bit of news about Lainey, she is mending, still only one armed but hopeful of starting rehabilitation on her wing soon, she is no longer a startling technicolour with only a little brusing still visible. Lots of well wishes from all your sewing mates Lainey and hope to see you soon, if only for a cuppa and a chat.

Almost everyone was busy, busy at the Cottage on Wednesday, either researching new projects,

working on existing,

discussing pros and cons of designs,

Marie and Margaret were both heads down and busy, busy, Marie is starting on a new lot of hexies, got the box all ready to fill.

Val was stitching a panel, one of four that will make a lovely quilt

Val plans on taking a break from the Cottage for a bit, she will be sorely missed and we all wish her well.

Jackie was binding a lovely table runner, er, mat for under her sewing machine, it started its life out as a different project entirely and no, not a runner, could have been a bag? but it is going to be a terrific machine mat.

Karen, at Margs insistence shared her finished table runner, really had to do some arm twisting as you can guess.
Summer side

and flip over for the Winter side.

Karen reckons the Spring/Autum one is 'in the wash', guess that's one way of saying it.

Then there were those who were just urm...enjoying the ambience,

Really have to admire Sue, she is rather adept at making a 'take along' stitching project last, got everything out but not a needle in sight, and if she isn't careful she is going to loose that poor little circle that is half way across the table there, so of course another one will have to be created, could take ages...
Of course when she gets on that mighty machine of hers its go, go, go.

The panels we are creating for the local chapter of Days for Girls carry bags have certain requirements regarding seams and seam placement.
The size is to be raw edge finished 13" wide by 32" long and can be made up in a variety of ways. (Yep - the original size asked for was a little larger, but that would mean Sue would have to cut them all down before overlocking the edges.

Sue has made up samples for us to follow.

Firstly, NO BOTTOM SEAMS, that is, on the fold line at the bottom of the bag or in other words the middle of the created fabric length.

also there needs to be at least 3" depth of fabric on each end of the created length to allow for a casing to be created.

all seams need to be machine neatened and therefore strengthened, these bags will be expected to be in use for approx 4 years.
If you have an overlocker, that is the preferred method of stitching the seams, otherwise you can either use a zig zag stitch

of one type or another, including vertical or strip joins.

Another method of seam neatening is either a flat fell seam, lots of Youtube vids including this one or a mock flat fell seam where you lay your top fabric edge 1/2" in from the underneath fabric, stitch a 1/4" seam, fold fabric over encasing the raw edge and stitch down to give a finish like below.

If piecing the 13" strips you also need to make sure there is a couple of inches of length at edges.

another method is if you have a 13" x 32" strip of plain fabric, stitch a colourful panel on the front, folding in the raw edges as below.

Jackie spied a whole pile of stash fabric that she could cut to size to use as bags, de-stash and support all in one go, winner, winner!