The Petrillo Bag Along

The Petrillo Along is starting!

You might remember that I saw this bag a few weeks ago and extolled its virtues, most of which had to do with it being a vertical bag that was good sized, but not a Rotator Cuff Injury inducing size. I posted a ‘warning’ in a post on March 18 that we would be starting soon and Pam, of Hip to Be a Square fame, talked about the bag along in her episode 121 podcast. We have finally gotten our acts together, other projects in order and are ready to go. Pam already posted the notice of the ‘Along’ yesterday and I am following along in her footsteps to catch my readers as well.

Here is the schedule that Pam laid out:

• Week 1 (week of 4/7/2013) – assemble pattern pieces, supplies, and get fabric cut out.
• Week 2 (next week, starting on 4/14) – sew the bag.

I may have to modify it to:

• Week 1 (week of 4/7/2013) – assemble pattern pieces, and supplies
• Week 2 (week of 4/14/2013) – Cut out the fabric
• Week 3 (starting on 4/21) – sew the bag
• Week 4 (starting 4/28) – finish up

I know that we all have a different working pace and obligations. Pam works quickly, so don’t be intimidated by her pace. I have to be out of town a couple of times this month and I like to work slowly on bags. Pick  (or make up) the schedule that works for you. Pam is in the middle of her Labyrinth quilt, so the only hope I have of finishing the Petrillo bag anywhere close to when Pam does is to get started immediately and sew like a demon. 😉 I would advise you to focus on having fun.

If you need to buy the pattern you can get it instantly (or nearly instantly) as it is a downloadable pattern. It is only $8.

There are some specialty supplies you need to probably get online. Sara suggests different places to get the supplies. I had seen Soft & Stable at the Road to California quilt show I attended last year. I was interested in trying it, but didn’t buy any as I didn’t have a suitable project at the time. Thus, for this project, I ended up buying the Soft and Stable from ByAnnie.com. I am not affilated with that site and don’t think it was the absolute cheapest site, but I was in a rush and wanted to make sure I got the right stuff. Amazon was out at the time. The package was sent out really quickly. I received the Soft & Stable in a few days.

I bought the snaps from AGraffSupplies on Etsy. I am not affiliated with that site. They had the snaps cheaper than Sara’s preferred vendor. I compared and I am pretty sure the snaps were the same. The confusing part about both Etsy shops was that it was hard to tell how many I was buying. I ended up with a big bag of magnetic snaps – many more than I needed. I’ll have to go on a bag making binge to use them all up. Nota bene: These turned out to the wrong ones. You need to buy SEW-IN magnetic snaps. I didn’t even realize such a thing existed.

I bought the Shape Flex, which seems to be muslin with fusible on the back from Beverly’s online.

Pam made the Aeroplane bag pattern and says “Sara’s patterns are awesomely written with clear instructions and lots of pictures”.  Pam is making one change to the bag construction; rather than using the Soft & Stable, she will be using “a combination of Pellon Decor Bond (a home dec weight interfacing) along with Pellon Fusible Fleece.”  If you want to make changes like that, then Pam is your girl. I wasn’t happy with the floopy results of changing out fusible fleece for two layers of regular batting and some interfacing when I made my last Chubby Charmer, so I am going to stick with the directions on supplies for the most part. It is also a good opportunity for me to try the Soft & Stable as well.

As Pam said, in addition to posting my progress here, I’ll be posting pictures to Sara’s usual Flickr group so she can see our work as well.

Go forth and make a Petrillo bag!

**Thanks to Sara at Sew Sweetness for allowing me to use her image.

Author: Jaye

Quiltmaker who enjoys writing and frozen chocolate covered bananas. View all posts by Jaye