The Blue Bag – a mess of glue and bling

I've been making a new skirt. It's in a lovely slinky-drapey navy fabric, but it's not finished yet because it needs a zipper and I've been struggling to insert one without a proper zipper foot – so all zipper projects are still on hold.  But it's all cut out and ready and I have some fabric left over.

I'm a sucker for matching accessories – I made the Molly bag to match my Paper Bag Skirts.  So I decided to make a new handbag to go with this navy skirt.  But I only had a little fabric left over and looked around for a pattern that would only use a small amount – and I came across the Buttercup bag – perfect.

The pattern is free to download with great instructions and the bag was ready in no time.  I didn't have any interfacing, so I just left it without and the bag is rather soft and floppy.  I also didn't have a magnetic snap so I had to sew on a regular snap fastening.  The problems  of limited sewing supplies.

I was really happy with the bag.  But I wanted more bling – I had these blue rhinestones I got from the fabric shop.  I had no idea what I was going to do with them at the time I bought them, but I really liked the color.  I thought they would look great on the bag.  But how do I stick them on? I know, I've got a glue gun.

It's a mini glue gun, very tiny and takes the small little glue sticks.  I'd bought it ages ago and then never used it – my usual story. I even laid them out in a lovely scrolling pattern.  But actually getting them on the bag in this pattern was damned impossible.  I tried applying a tiny bit of glue to the back of the rhinestones, but the tip of the glue gun was too hot and I kept burning my fingers.  So I tried to apply a  little glue to the bag, but the blobs were too big, or I would get all these stringy glue bits everywhere, or it would be no longer tacky by the time I got the stone on it.  It was nothing short of a disaster.  So I gave up and I have one side plain and one side with an assortment of random messy blue stones and a lot of spare glue. Sigh.

But – the bag is awesome.  It's just the right size and shape, uses a small amount of fabric and I love it.  I'm sorry I messed up with the glue gun.  I can see I'll be making more of these in the future.