I accumulated a bunch of fun sewing and quilting books over the holidays and I’m excited to share them with you over the next few days. My hope is that you’ll find something that resonates with you and add it to your crafty library!
Today I’ll start with On The Go Bags by Lindsay Connor and Janelle MacKay.
On the Go Bags by Lindsay Conner and Janelle MacKay
First off, this is a great book for people like me, who want to get over their fear of 3-D sewing!! It contains sewing patterns for a total of 15 projects including purses, totes, organizers and more.
For sure, I need to make this laptop keeper and I love the fact that it’s one of the easiest projects in the book! In fact, I appreciate how each project includes the difficulty level right at the start of the instructions. On the Go Bags includes 5 easy projects, 6 intermediate projects and 5 advanced projects. There’s something for everyone in this book!
Here’s a pic of the table of contents so you can get a feel for the range of projects included.
I love all of the great sewing designers they included, too. I’m not as involved in the sewing community as I am in the quilting community. However, there are several names I recognize and I can attest that the quality of their patterns in this book is just as good as the material that they produce individually.
Here’s another project I want to make, again from the easy section:
I need lots and lots of purse and tote pockets!!
For those like me that haven’t sewn too many functional items besides quilts, I really enjoyed the beginning sections of the book which includes things like how to work with interfacings, and how to make bag straps. There’s even a section on bias binding and piping (which could be applied to making quilts).
I think On the Go Bags is a great book to add to your sewing library!
I’m curious, what kinds of non-quilty items do you like to sew?
Christa Quilts 
I like it!! Thank you for the review – I am going to look the book up. As someone who used to make my own linen suits for work back in the day when you wore suits to work every day, to someone who cuts up fabric to make fabric that is called a quilt.. I love the idea of the cool accessories that this book offers. Thank you for the review!
I’ve always enjoyed making children’s toys, stuffies but also homes or beds. Years ago I made a family of sweet little bears. I then used luan board to fit into each of the walls, floors and roof for the home that I sewed for them. I now need grandchildren to sew for.
I had decided or resolved to not make as many large quilts this year. I thought I would tackle a duffel bag. I also just made a pocket wrap that will hold my quilt accessories when I go to class and to retreats. I decided that I would complement it with a thread catcher made from the same fabric. Lastly the youngest grandchild got an 18″ doll for Christmas, so maybe a small wardrobe( christmas dress, jogging outfit and summer clothes) for her. I also want to practise more free motion. Lots of fun.
Unfortunately, I have an almost complete mental block against sewing anything that’s not actually a quilt! It’s pretty ridiculous. I can hand-piece a queen sized quilt before I can make a potholder! I have managed to sew and complete a few other things – I made some quilted notebook covers, a set of placemats, two tree-skirts, and one sweatshirt jacket – but each project took inordinately long time from start to finish because I got stuck repeatedly, I really detested the process, and had to make myself finish each of the projects. I still haven’t been able to make any tote bags, which is something I’d love to do.
I make towels with a button on it to hang from the oven or refrigerator handle, microwave cozi”s, braided bowls, potholders amongst other things, some of which I sell, and I also knit and crochet scarves, just the easy ones..
I enjoy making the small quilted boxes for the residents of our local nursing home. I give them out as bingo prizes. The ladies just love them.
There seams(!) to be a resurgence of interest, on the part of quilters, for things other than quilted items…..even clothing!! It’s been a long time and our schools have dropped any type of teaching of these skills. Too many cheap sources of ready-mades out there.
Great review and definitely piqued my interest!!!!
I’ve been sewing ‘organizer’ bags which incidentally make great ‘gift bags.” I knit a baby sweater and blanket and made a coordinating bag which the new mom could use to store diapers etc.
The book looks like it has some fun and very practical projects! I enjoy sewing for my baby granddaughters and projects for the home. I learned how to sew many years ago and am new to quilting, but I’m having so much fun with quilting, I haven’t sewn many projects lately. I think it’s mainly because of all the beautiful fabric collections in quilting right now. 🙂
I am making bags, pot holders, curtains, clothes and I do embroidery and knitting.
I like making towel and pot holder sets, and those little fabric boxes are great to store anything from sewing notions to candy in your work area.