Weekender Travel Bag

Hooray - it's done! After hoarding this fabric for ages and then having "issues" making it my Amy Butler Weekender Travel bag is finally done! I am so relieved.

The pattern is not really difficult but there are a lot of steps and the biggest problem is the bulk of the seams as you get closer to the end where you have multiple layers of fabric and Timtex to sew.

I wish I had done a bit more research before starting, if you are going to make this bag do yourself a favour and google and read everyone's tips before starting (unlike me). I was saved by my Mum in the end who let me borrow her machine which is when I discovered she had a double sided zipper foot and I could sew with the bulk of the bag on the outside. I did a lot of cursing while sewing this trying to feed the big bulky bag through my very basic sewing machine as the girls who went to the craft retreat with me can testify!

There are no inner pockets on the pattern so I decided to add a zipped inner pocket, a side pocket where I can put my mobile phone and a swivel hook where I can attach my keys (I lose them in my small bag).

Here's a picture to give you an idea of the size, this bag is very large and would store a lot. Overall I'm okay with how this turned out but because of some of the problems I had my corner seams were quite large so when I got around to attaching the side panels to the front and back I ended up with a lot of puckering. It's going to drive me crazy every time I look at it.

Now that I've finished this though and have a good idea of how it all fits together I think making this again would be quite easy. This one is made in decorator weight fabric (Amy Butler August Fields) but I think it would be okay in quilting weight with a bit of extra interfacing added... after all my whingeing I can't believe I'm contemplating another one already.