Start Date   End Date   Photo   Description   I am getting more milage out of that Paradise Bag than I think anyone could have imagined. But it just shows how you can take a simple pattern and keep adapting it through small tweaks, fabric choices, and creative embellishments. Or at least it shows me...I guess the people who put the patterns together already know that.

Anyhoots, this whole bag started around a funny beaded necklace I spotted one morning. I picked three fabrics that I thought went well with the coral and golden beads. I altered the sizes on the paradise bag pattern, using peices of fabric that were:

• bag and liner: 21 x 36
• bottom panel: 21 x 7

I assembled the bag as normal, using 1.5 inch triangles to make the bottom of the bag. Before I attached the handles, I used spare fabric from the handles to make two 3 inch long strings. I folded these in half to make loops inside of the bag that I attached near the handles. I attached one end of the the necklace to each of the loops, thus anchoring it in the bag.

I put the necklace "in" the bag along with the handles as I attached the liner to the bag. Once I birthed the bag, the necklace and the handles popped out. My seam allowances swollowed all the loops and I ended up sewing the ends of the necklace into the seem, whiched turned out to look fine. I have to be extra careful not to sew into a bead and break any more needles. (I lost more than one before I got the knack of that).

Instead of using a plastic bottom, I used a heavy iron on fusing to thicken the bottom, which seemed to work out fine. I did use horse hair, iron on fusing to stiffen the walls. For a previous bag I had used light weight fusing, which I found unsatisfactory. So now I am down with make bald spots on horses if that is what it takes.