You know when you want to start doing something – ie: sewing your own purses… but you are concerned that you will love it too much, and then it will become an obsession?

And you won’t be able to stop… and then you will need all the patterns. And all the materials. And then your stash (which is already significant) will grow and grow… and take over your whole house?

That’s me… and I want to make all the bags! And, oh wait… sewing has already taken over the house anyhow…

I started sewing bags when I created the Forest Glen Satchel – my first “real” pattern. I made a Chobe (from Elle Puls) in 2016 and created the first purse of my dreams – perfectly slouchy with lots of room.

Fast forward a year and Swoon patterns kept coming up in my Instagram feed. I needed to make another bag! How could I justify buying another pattern when my Chobe was still going strong? How about for a gift?! Surely my mom could use a new cross body bag? So the justification (and new obsession) continues! (*lol, I think?!*)

All that aside, I do love making bags and have quite a few more that I have to photograph to show you. The process ticks all the boxes in my goal to sew as neatly and professionally as possible. I think my girls will be needing new purses soon so I can justify a few more?! (Their Sweet Talk Phone Bags are still great, but I should have used a bit of Scotch Guard on them – kids are hard on their purses!)

Find the Glenda Convertible Clutch Pattern review below…

Glenda Convertible Clutch Review

Things I Liked

• This bag is so cute! It has a timeless design and you can’t go wrong with that.
• I learned a lot of fun tricks in the instructions.
• It has great structure – this is probably helped by my using vegan leather for the exterior.
• I was super impressed that the Skyline S7 I had on loan sewed through all of the vinyl layers without any issue.
• It was fun to add a tiny piece of sewing fabric as the interior pocket lining – yay for moms that sew!

Things I Didn’t Like

• Honestly, nothing! The instructions were great and it turned out well.

Things I Changed

• I wanted a smaller bag – it’s actually quite long, despite how it looks in the pattern photos – so I removed 2″ from the width. Instead of 11″ wide, mine is 9″ wide.
• I also lengthened the strap to 50″ for a cross-body length.

Things for Next Time

• I think I would keep the smaller width next time as well. The wide width looks nice for a clutch, but seems very wide to use as a purse with a strap. (Plus, my pattern pieces are already taped in place at the new size!)