Paramouthy Stitches sent

On Wednesday I shared with you the amazing tote that I received from Di for our Paramouthy Stitches swap.  This swap was our own private swap that ran parallel to the Mouthy Stitches swap that both Di and I were too late to sign up for!  She suggested that perhaps we should swap a tote with each other so I jumped at the chance because Di is so lovely and makes wonderful things.  We met at Fat Quarterly Retreat in the summer and have been blog-pals ever since. 

And this is what I made for her:

Di's mosaic was filled with rainbow colours and a variety of shapes.  I'm not naturally a rainbow person so I gathered two piles of potential fabrics - one full of rainbow colours and one with pink and green colours (she likes pink and green).  In the end,  I managed to combine all of the chosen fabrics on the tote.  The tote and its various colours are linked through four fabrics - the grey main fabric, the pink, the green and the purple.

The grey fabric is the outside of the tote, the inside pen pocket and the keychain clutch.  The pink fabric is an appliqued bird as well as the handles, interior pocket lining and interior of the keychain clutch.  The green dotty fabric is a bird, a rectangle on the back of the tote and the tab on the keychain clutch.  And lastly, the purple Kaffe Fassett fabric is an appliqued bird and rectangle.  I gave the birds hand-stitched swirls that trailed to the other side of the tote.

This was the first time I had ever made an internal (hidden?) pocket with a zipper or attached a clip/hook thing for keys/keychain clutch. 

Top left picture show the bird zipper pull which ties in the red fabric
from the rainbow side.  The red and aqua fabrics on the tote are
both from Aneela Hoey's new 'Sew Stitchy' line.

The bottom row right hand picture shows the interior of the bag with the zippered pocket, pen pocket, crazy lining and the keychain clutch which attaches to the 'Live Long - Laugh Often' clip in the bottom row middle picture.  For the lining I used a foundation piecing log cabin fabric (kind of unique, right?) but afterwards wondered about my choice of cream fabric for the inside of a tote but maybe she's not a slob like me!!??

The birds were inspiration from her mosaic.  Their legs are my favourite thing -- I freemotioned them and they are quite wonky and hilarious but quite cute all at the same time.  I will need to replicate the birds for myself one day as they brought a lot of joy and humour to me in my sewing room over the last week.   This is what they looked like on the wrong side:

And there you have it.  That pretty much describes the tote and keychain that I made Di  for our amazing (and very fun!!) Paramouthy Stitches swap!  Click here to see what she made for me :)  And can you believe it - this is one of the many things I listed on my 4th Quarter Finish Along list with Quilter in the Gap!  Yay - I finished something!

P.S.  I also made her a little key purse/coin purse thing:

Linking to Finish it up Friday, TGIFF OctoberQuest and October Finishes.



October Finishes