On March 22, 2014 I posted a photo to Instagram asking people to tell me which pattern to make next: The Mortmain or The Flora.  I went with the Mortmain (seen here) and made a muslin of Flora within a few weeks. Wellll, it took 3 years, 2 month and about a week for me to get back to her. I needed to do a full bust adjustment and had no idea how to at the time so I just said to hell with it and used the skirt a bunch of times. When I saw the Outback Wife line of Bark Cloth by Gertrude Made I thought it would work perfectly as Flora and set to work drafting my FBA! With 3 years of alterations under my belt it was easy peasy! One of the first Indie patterns I ever made used Bark Cloth from Grey’s Fabric and I always look for it now so I was very excited when this collection was released. I first learned about it on the Village Haberdashery Instagram, …

I’ve been following Noodlehead since I started quilting and it honestly never dawned on me to make one of her bags. It never dawned on me to make a bag period! The hardware and lots of pieces intimidated me a bit. I toyed around with the idea of making some simple tote bags, but I have so many tote bags. Free bag with this purchase, free bag with that purchase, etc, etc. If I was going to make something it was going to be awesome and not even in the same realm as a free tote! When I saw the Noodlehead Explorer tote I knew it was time to take the plunge. The pattern is very cute and although I made this version exactly as the pattern says it also has a lot of potential for hacking. I’m thinking magnetic snaps instead of a zipper, no front flap, extra pockets on the inside, the smaller version with the cross body strap; so many possibilities! I had purchased some waxed canvas 2 years ago from Gather Here …

I, Carolanne, of Sweet Carolanne, sign up as a participant of Me-Made-May ’16. I endeavor to wear at least one hand-sewn item each day for the duration of May 2016. If you’ve been following my blog for a while you may notice this is the same pledge I made last year. Towards of the end of May last year I was getting kind of lazy and just throwing on a plantain tee and calling it a day so I want to add to my pledge that I will actually make an effort to look presentable every day! I’m also going to make a real effort to wear the me mades that I make, wear once and forget about. If they don’t get worn they are going to my sisters or to be donated! For the sake of taking stock, I am also not going to buy any fabric in May! My stash is starting to overflow into areas it never lived before so while I’m attempting to wear more of what I make, I figured …