Stephanie and I were busy over the Thanksgiving break. I brought my new Stampin’ Up! Scallop Square Clear Big Shot Die with me so that we could play with. We found the perfect project to make and got busy very quickly. This idea came from two blogs that I like to visit – Heather Summers and Angie Juda. Stephanie is a quilter so she has lots of fabric and the Big Shot has become a popular tool for quilters because you can cut a stack of fabric with the steel-ruled dies at the same time. So that is exactly what we did and we made these cute fabric purses.
The larger snowman purse Stephanie made for herself. 
I made the smaller one with the little children fabric for my niece – she is almost 3 so I don’t think she is reading my blog. I plan to put some fun things inside and give it to her for Christmas.
We cut fabric for probably 5 more purses. Stephanie and my niece Emily are making some more and then I cut fabric for two more also. I brought all the pieces home and now I have to sew them together.
These came together so much faster than it would seem. We cut the fabric into strips and then folded them up to fit over the Scallop Square die and cut 8 pieces of fabric at a time. The purses are actually reversible if you wanted them to be. So in between two scallop squares you sandwich a piece of batting. Then we sewed a straight stitch across the two diagonals from corner to corner. We did that for all the squares – you have a front, back, bottom and two sides.
Then we sewed the squares together to form strips. And then the strips together to form the front and back. Then you stitch the front and back to either side of the bottom. Before stitching the sides up you need to add a handle and stitch the tops of each square shut.
On Stephanie’s bag she added a fabric handle which she stitched. On my smaller one I used some of the Real Red Double Stitched ribbon.
Oh the other great thing about this die is that it is clear so you can see what you are cutting if you need to. On the snowman purse I positioned it on the line of snowmen to either pick one that was centered or to put two inside the square. It made it easy to position.
After you sew up the sides we did go back and snip in between the scallops to create a fringe effect. Once these get washed they will have more of a shabby look to them. I think we were all surprised at how quickly we were able to make these.
When the others are done I’ll get pictures and post those too. Aren’t they cute? I want to find some other fabric and make some everyday ones too.
I one of those good days today where things just seem to be where you need them to be. A successful day you could call it. I have been looking this week for Cranberry Walnut bread that Greg wanted and since today is his birthday I wanted to get him some. This morning I decided to look up recipes but most of what I found was more like a cake like banana bread rather than bread made yeast. Today I decided to check at Publix and couldn’t find any but this time I asked and sure enough they had a loaf in the freezer – it just needed baking. So I brought it home to bake – yeah success! And while I was there I stopped at the little meal center where they cook and he had a chicken recipe all prepared – it was very good and I was asking what was on the chicken – he said “Panko” – well guess what – I have a recipe at home that I want to make and it uses Panko and I had no idea where to find it. It was from a cooking show and sometimes I think they use unusual ingredients that I can’t always find. But he had some right there and I got that too – yeah success again! Then I came home and made Oatmeal Raisin cookies from scratch – Greg was happy when he got home from work – and another success! So all was good today.
Thanks for stopping by today! Happy crafting and cooking!
