Day Two of Rabbit Holes

I'm into sewing, knitting and cross stitching, although the stitching took a back burner after bifocals came into my life. I have a small stash of fabric and a when knitting came along project bags took on a new look and place in my life.

When I was stitching I really enjoyed vinyl mesh bags, most of my projects are still in those bags. A new design was popping up for qsnaps and projects that has stitching incorporated into the bag. I haven't made one of those yet but those are on my radar.

This is my latest creation. Fell in love with the Fringe Supply Co. Field Bag and l really like the size and canvas fabric so much that I own two. I decided to surf Etsy and see if others were making similar bags. Many many bags popped up and after getting a feel for the bag size and construction I pulled out what little home decor fabric I had and made the bag. I have another bag cut out and after test driving this one I'll make any necessary tweaks and make the second bag.

I also make bags with matching DPN needle minders and notions bags. I may have shown these before. My sweet sister keeps asking how many bags do I need? But I like to change them up frequently.

My favorite style is a wedge bag and I have material for several more. It fits several skeins of yarn, a project, and notions pouch. I am also addicted to purchasing them from The Fat Squirrel, Amy Beth's bags are really nice. The construction is top notch and I love her fabric choices. There is a retreat coming up and she will be vending. I'm going to have a hard time not purchasing more. Ordered the retreat bag already.  :)

I made and use this bag all the time. 

Several other bag makers will be at the retreat market and I've been saving my purchase $$ for a bag from Hopkin's Studio. I want to see her bags in person, they are a little more expensive and she has so many fabrics I can't choose which is just right. 

So many bags, so little time to make and use them all!

Rabbit Holes

I've fallen down several rabbit holes lately. As I've said before I'm not good about keeping this blog up to date! So I've decided to blog in chunks.

Today is about current inspirations.

As I said, I'm falling down a particular rabbit hole of traveler's notebooks. I don't currently have one, I don't bullet journal, I just don't journal at all! (lack of blog posts are a sure sign!) But I carried around a planner in the late 80's/90's (I'm old) and they went everywhere with me. I became a techie and I jumped on the Palm Pilot band wagon and transferred my planner stuff to the digital realm.

Eventually Palm was bought up and phased out. I jumped onto the Blackberry, things transferred easily and all was good in the tech world until I worked on my master's. APPLE!!! Oh how I love Thee! It took a few years and I was able to splurge on a laptop and down that rabbit hole I went!

Don't get me wrong, I'm typing on a macbook right now. But I have probably a dozen notebooks in my living room/bookcases. Unused! Used! and I'm just a cheap paper junky. I still love notebooks and planners. But the majority are unused.

I tried to go digital with my lesson planner but just couldn't make it work. I found a great planner by Miss Math Dork and fell in love with paper planners again.   Two years ago I found Blue Sky Planners and that is what I use today. Really use. Nice, simple, very straightforward and I love them.

So how does that get me to traveler's notebooks. 

1) Well, I've also fallen down the fountain pen rabbit hole and use them with my scripture writing. But I wanted to use pens more and I find myself out and about with no paper. I'm trying to become slightly more organized, but not to the point of creating a bullet journal.

2) I need to meal plan. I realized I buy the same basic groceries every week, I don't use part of them and that is wasteful. I've also found myself not cooking at all. I think doing some basic meal planning will help me with diet and the economics of grocery shopping. Keeping those plans in a notebook will help me shop. Yes I can add them to my phone memo list but I think writing things out will help me stay focused.

3) I knit and love making lists of knitting info. I also have knitting friends who use TN's and every time they whip one out to jot stuff down, I get envious. :)

I love notebooks!

I love Goulet Pens and follow them on instagram and YouTube. I use them for my fountain pens obsession. They have fantastic customer education videos. Goulet carries pens and paper. I've watched several of their videos on TN's and thanks to YouTube data miners up popped lots of other TN videos. I've spent the morning watching those and surfing Etsy for the right notebook cover. 

From there Pinterest called my name and away it went. Thankfully, I put on the brakes and decided to add this quick post before I reached the bottom of this rabbit hole. I've figured out the size needed, found a supplier that offered a totally me color and now just waiting a few days to make sure I really need to do this!

ps it will may if I jot down some blog post ideas!