My favourite knitting magazine for quality freebies is Simply Knitting. April's issue was no exception, arriving as it did with a set of bag handles and a pattern supplement of cute bag patterns. I selected Amanda Jones' Petite & Pretty grab bag because (a) it looked the easiest, and (b) I had most of the yarn for it in stash.
The majority of the bag is knitted in Bergere de France Galaxie in a shade delightfully christened Supernova, which I happened to have a couple of balls of. Unfortunately, I didn't have the contrast shade, which should have been a green with the slightly less glamorous moniker of Norma. I didn't want to have to send for one ball of yarn so I had a quick look round and decided that some Sublime Lustrous Extrafine Merino DK in pink used double would do. It retrospect, it was still a bit thin, but I went with it.
The bag is knitted on 7mm circular needles from the bottom up. As the body of the bag is in garter stitch, I found myself in the slightly odd position of having to purl using circulars. The top of the bag was knitted 1x1 rib.
As with all circular knits, the finishing was easy - I weaved in the ends and then mattress stitched the bottom seam.
To attach the handles, you simply oversewed them onto the bag in the contrast yarn. I decided against knitting the flower embellishment in the pattern and instead used a vintage style lace motif from my stash (I think it might be from Melody Ross).
To line the bag, I cut two rectangles of lilac spotty fabric from a fat quarter pack I got from Hobbycraft. I sewed the sides and bottom together on my sewing machine and then folded over the top edge and pressed. I hand sewed the lining into the bag, but then decided it was a bit messy. To cover up the dodgy stitching, I glued a ribbon trim to the top of the lining with fabric glue.
I pronounce the overall result "quite pretty". However, this is quite a delicate bag, possibly useful for carrying feathers or maybe a lace handkerchief. I have a long history of wrecking bags by carrying far too much in them. Hence, it will only be getting an outing when my luggage needs are minimal...
Melx
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