It’s sew easy a blogger can do it.

Ordinarily I can talk myself out of impulse purchases (except shoes, handbags, books and various kitchen implements), but something strange happens to me when I walk into a fabric store. One caress of a bolt of brightly patterned fabric and all my self-control disappears. Visions of handcrafted hats, sassy skirts, quirky quilts and, of course, bitchin’ bags, fog my rationale and I just can’t help myself.

A yard of this. A fat quarter of that. A bolt of the other one over there … and I’m hauling out a mother lode of textiles before I remember I can hardly operate a pair of scissors.

Mom and I spent over three hours at the Log Cabin co-op boutique last week. It’s this great store that was once a fabric/quilt shop, but is now a storehouse of inspiration that just so happens to provide everything you could ever need for a fabric-based project. Crafters and quilters and sewers from all over the area sell their completed wares in cozy little corners throughout the building, and many of them also stock patterns, textiles and just about everything else you’d need to make an apron (or backpack or quilt or skirt or whatever) of your very own.

Mom and I felt so motivated after browsing through every single nook and cranny that we totally believed my mom-in-law (Marsha, the Master Quilter) when she told us we could complete the same handbag she’d just finished …in a single lazy Sunday afternoon.

Over the past three days I’ve dedicated roughly 19.7 hours to the creation of the “so easy” small sling bag (to be fair, this does include three grueling hours of choosing just the right fabric). By hour 9 I was so totally over the stupid thing that I wanted to use the bag’s strap as a noose to hang myself. Mom’s machine went haywire during hour 7, so we had to double up on mine. I wore out my seam ripper by hour 11, so I had to borrow Mom’s.

But last night, just before the clock chimed midnight, we stitched our final seams. As we tidied up our piles of flung seam gauges, spent bobbins and fabric markers, we swore we’d never get in over our heads, ever again. By breakfast time we were plotting a visit to a new fabric store that’s rumored to have opened somewhere in the 5 Mile area …

You can find the Log Cabin co-op at 4922 E. Union, just off Trent and Waterworks.