Another Duffel Bag

This isn't a cool make, it isn't an interesting make, but it is an angry make.

Ever since the 5p carrier bag charge came in I seem to spend most of my time trying to cram bits and pieces of shopping into my handbag because I haven't remembered my bag for life. 

Now I get it, 5p isn't a lot for a carrier bag, however when one of the stronger ones is 10p, then 5p for something that's gonna split halfway home soon starts to add up. So I would buy a 10p one BUT! I've been doing that since the law came in, and now I have more bags for life than I need. In fact my bags for life will probably last longer than my actual life. 

So since I've got 20 bags for life at home and don't really need another , I've been stuffing things in my handbag. And them my handbag broke......... and I lost it.

I reuse my carrier bags thankyou! I ranted quietly to myself at the till after begrugingly handing over 10p [via my card as I don't carry cash] and then I came straight home and made this so I'd always have a bag in my handbag.

Its just a really simple duffel bag, it ain't pretty, it ain't fancy but it does the trick.

I threw it together in 20 minutes of rage induced sewing whilst cursing the people who were simply throwing their carrier bags away after a weekly shop! Who are these people? don't they have packed lunches, and cat litter trays and dog poo to dispose of? DON'T THEY HAVE A CARRIER BAG CUPBOARD!??????  

Why did they have to ruin my recycling? I mean what's my child suppose to vomit into in the car? what will I use as a dirty clothes bag when I go on holiday? 

So yeah some RAGE sewing after my favourite handbag broke.

Much Love

Frankie

P.S I think it goes without saying that I love the environment and obviously the plastic bag tax came in for reasons that go over my little head, but everyone I know reused them in very imaginative ways so.......... I guess I just don't get it! 

X

A throw everything in it Duffel bag!

We love taking little man swimming, and after much trial and error we've found a place where the water is warm, it doesn't cot the earth and that has family changing rooms! Family changing rooms are a complete game changer as far as I'm concerned. Some of the pools we've been previously only had men's and women's and seen as the men's never seem to have a play pen, or well anything I always ended up trying to sort out the baby, then sort myself whilst making sure said baby didn't soak himself all over again!

Now I take lil man into the changing room and start to get him dried off, whilst Rikki has his shower [My hair is far too long for the piddly trickle that swimming pool showers offer so I have a bath when I get home] then once both the boys are ready they go and sit in the cafe and have a drink [£2.10 for a pint!] and I get all the time I want to get ready! [I think the beer helps with the waiting]

I've gotta say I love having the time to myself to dry off properly , apply moisturiser [The chlorine is a killer for my skin] do my hair and apply some make up so I don't look like a troll as we are leaving!

But that does mean I, in particular end up carrying a lot of stuff around!

Enter the duffel bag! 

Previously we've been using bags for life, but that only leaves you with one hang free, so I whipped this up using a certain remnant that I really love! And some scrap pieces of linen!

I top stitched all my straps and added a pocket to the front for chucking smaller bits like my phone and locker money in.

All in all it didn't take very long to sew up at all, In fact I'm thinking of making one for Rikki and one for lil man so we each have one for when we go and stay at families houses etc. I think it might be easier than our usual system of using bags for life and then watching everything spill out of said bag for life! 

I love the fabric combination on this though and the fact that its HUGE! I mean seriously pretty sure you could carry a child around in this! I didn't cut the fabric I used for the mainly body of the bag instead I just whipped out my maths gcse and worked out how big my circle needed to be based on the dimensions! 

I will do a full thing on working it out at some point but for now :

measure your main fabric width,

divide that measurement by 3.14 [pi] and then you have the diameter for your circle! [remember the diameter is from edge to edge of a circle.

I did button holes at the top to thread the straps through the channelling but I'm pretty sure I got one twisted.

And I used some D rings from an old handbag to give it more a store brought feel. Although I have miss judged slightly and made the straps too skinny for the rings!

I like my X top stitching though! Its pretty tidy!

I took these photos with a few towels stuffed in to give it more shape.

All in all I'm calling it a grand success.

In other news I'm still feeling icky, I'm not sure what's up apart from me getting the boys cold anyway I'm trying to combat it all by resting and eating right. In fact as we speak I've got my feet up and I'm watching star wars revenge of the sith. As much as I love the old movies the costumes in the first three are awesome! Particularly the queens! 

Anyway I'm off to rest and try and finish this blooming Miette cardigan!

Much Love

Frankie

My Second Anya Bag

After how much I loved my first anya bag I just had to make another one. 

I've already waxed lyrically about how much I love this pattern and how well SoZo wrote it so I won't cover all that again.

Construction wise I just followed the condensed version of the instructions, I like this colour way a lot more than my previous Anya Bag it just feels a lot more like me. 

The outer fabric is this awesome woven blue and white thing that I was given by my Nan. I have no idea where she got it from but its fully luscious, I actually love it and this was the last of it , which makes me really sad.

In fact I had so little of the fabric left that I had to cut all of the pieces out flat and I had to piece the strap so that's in three parts but because of the looser weave I don't think you can really tell. In fact that's the only thing I did differently to the actual pattern, I chose to make it with one long strap as opposed to two shorter ones, I always tend to wear bags across the body so it just make more sense to me. But it didn't alter the order of the construction just where I positioned them.

My buttonhole went in first time no issues and looked beautiful , gonna be honest I felt like a bit of a sewing goddess when that happened.

And the button came from my stash, It's a shame really because I had hoped to use one of my single buttons and this one has a pair, which is a shame but this one was the best match and this way I have a spare.

The lining is cheap and cheerful some kind of nasty faux silk stuff. It came from one of my nieces too small dressing up outfits, Don't say I don't recycle!!! It looks really cute and I had just enough of it but boy was it a swine to sew, it moved faster than a small child who sees a bag of sweets.

So yeah I'm giving this make a solid 10/10 I think its going to get a lot of wear especially when the sun comes out and I need a lighter handbag.

In other news we had a huge family day today, my cousin and her five children came down and we all congregated at my mums which was lovely, although my brother was missed because he had to work. It was a really lovely day and I was lucky enough that one of her kids was nice enough to look after lil man and make sure he kept himself out of trouble. Which meant I got to have some much needed grown up time. Plus I got to snuggle a baby! WINNER! We had 8 kids in total although I guess two of those don't really count as kids because they are taller than me. So six kids and 2 teenagers!!

  Anyway I'm not sure how not supervising my child and just chatting and drinking tea could be so exhausting but i am pooped! And I'm hosting the Liverpool football final tomorrow so I need to be my perkiest! [Note: I'm not hosting the actual final, that's at Wembley although the idea of martin skirtle being in my garden is quite lovely.....swoons. We're just having people round to watch the match] Anyway This has lead my decide that the rest of my evening should be spent hand stitching I'm not even going to get my sewing machine out I'm just going to get into bed and chill!

And maybe fall asleep

And watch very trashy telly!

Much Love

Frankie 

xxx

New items and an inappropriate moment!

Well for starters I've added three new items to my etsy shop! The link can be found on the right hand side of the page or you can click this, https://www.etsy.com/listing/222233772/purple-knitted-owl-doorstop

And it will take you to this lil beauty! 

And then you can find these aswell...

Please do go and have a lil looksy! 

In other news I did this most stupid thing ever this morning. 

Every morning I take my purse and phone out of my big handbag and place them in one of my many satchels for the walk to nursery. 

And I did that this morning, except I didn't realise which satchel I'd picked up until I noticed to giggling six year old boy and his father and the stares of at least three disapproving mothers! 

A nice jazzy print from a distance? 

Yeah that's actually a print of semi naked pin up girls! It's actually one of my very favourite bags (brought for me by momma and poppa Knitwit) but I'm not sure it's entirely appropriate for nursery! 

That's be calling me that loose moraled scandalous mother now! (Although some of them thought I was 15 , so I've probobly been called that already!) 

Much love

A very saucy

Frankie

Xxx

Spoiling myself!

Every now and again a girls gotta spoil herself right? Well I had to at least! 

I brought myself this cute little bag from amazon, the description said owl but I think it looks like a fox? Am I right or just going crazy? 

It's quite a good size and the quality isn't too bad for not I paid for it (literally a few pounds)

In other news I've started ANOTHER embroidery! Yes it's an addiction, no I don't want to enter your program.

This is my outline it's loosely based on an  image I found on Pinterest that has since disappeared! 

As it's so whimsical I'm gonna try and stash bust my embroidery threads on this one. 

Yerp that's all the left overs from a LOT of projects , I don't like throwing things away okay? Yes I acknowledge this is also a problem . No I don't want help with this either. 

It's not very far along at the moment becuase I've been super busy with orders! Yerp my order book is filling up for Christmas!  I'm willing to give anything a go (you in the back stop giggling) so email me if you have a project! I'm only taking on projects I know I can have done on time so I don't know how long my order books will open for! You can reach me at knitwitsowls@gmail.com and remember no project is too big or small!!

Much love 

Frankie 

Xxx

Party People

Does anyone remember my Moustache Bag? The one that I made during Pinterest week?

 

 

Well apart from one very indulgent selfie moment that ended up on twitter (I'm not a selfie kind of girl but this bag just begs to have silly pictures taken) It hasn't actually seen a lot of action.

 

 

Probably because I haven't seen a lot of action recently (Oi you in the back keep it clean) But I did get the opportunity to go out a while back to a very good friends 21st birthday party! And I did actually say I would put up a picture of me using it here. So better late than never here's how I wore it.

 

Prepare yourself not only am I using my "I'm so happy that I haven't had to deal with somebody else's bodily functions for a good two hours face" I am also very very pale, not pale and interesting, not porcelain doll looking. Just really really pale.

 

 

Okay so in a very fashion way

• Tartan Jacket - New Look (years ago I think I was about 14/15 when I brought this)
• Dress - Primark (I actually burnt the collar this week ironing it, as if I need more proof that I shouldn't iron)
• Tights - god knows my mum probably brought them, all I know is they are ladder proof!!!
• Hat - Vintage (My mum brought it for my brother, but I looked better in it, so I won!)
• Purse! - I made that!

As another point my friend here happens to be a very talented guitar player so I'll let him close with one of my favourite songs. You can also find him here.

 

Much Love

 

Frankie

 

xxx