the cowgirl purse

this is what i refer to as the cowgirl purse. i made it almost a year ago. and it took me longer than i week, i think. i made it out of a denim shirt that mom bought for me that had embroidery of a cowgirl on her horse on the back embriodered in large letters across the back shoulders it says "WESTERN". the patches on the purse are ones that i cut out of a beautiful vintage sheet with green flowers all over ith which i got at the salvation. this view is what i refer to as the "front" of the purse.



here is a detail of the pocket. i sewed a patch of the sheet to the pocket because i thought i was going to like the way it turned out-turns out i don't! oh well.





the bottom of the bag is a square.








side view and detail. i'm actually still not done with this bag. while i was putting on the finishing touches (the dog is laying right over my lap and nudging me and making it very h ard to type) like the zig-zag in the picture on the right, i ran out of thread!!!!! (for you non-sewers, this is a sewers worst nightmare!!!)


these are views of the "back" and strap of the purse. i had envisioned the strap coming out differently. i think it's a little too thick for my liking and for this purse. it doesn't go with the style of the purse, but it was a bitch to get it to work, so i'm not going to try to fix that any time soon.

this is the inside of the bag. i lined it with the beautiful vintage sheet fabric. (i looooove, love, looove this fabric!!!!)



this is the inside pocket. it's the first pocket i've ever made like this. i hada a brilliant idea to make this pocket that ad different places for my favorite things (cell phone, pens, and junk). i wanted this pocket to be multi-functional. then one fateful day, i was looking through my new martha stewart magazine (thanks ash!!) and there was a pattern for the exact pocket that i wanted to make!!!! and it was seeeeeeewwwwwwww easy!!!! (that was just a little pun for you.) seriously though-it was sew easy. so that's my pocket story.

now, remember how my first sentence in the last paragraph contained the word "inside"? well, i wanted this purse to be reverseable. SO IT IS!!! so it's either the inside or the outside pocket.



and voila! inside becomes outside!!! it kindof looks like a tool-belt pocket. man, that pocket!!


i really had high hopes for this purse. it was really the first serious purse i've ever made. i didn't really do any drawings for it, and i certainly didn't follow a pattern-just whatever my little heart desired.

the sad thing is that i put so much time and effort into it, but i've only used it a few times. i did a lot of things wrong with this purse. well, only one thing, really:

the strap

i really have a problem figuring out how long straps should be. i hem and haw and measure and re-measure, but it never seems to turn out right. the strap on this purse is okay, but i chose not to sew the arm hole closed and so there's a huge opening on the sides (big enough for an arm to fit through) and it makes me weary about using it too much. mostly because i don't want to lose any of my stuff!!!

BUT MAN, THAT POCKET!!!!!