It was bound to happen...

It started out so promising. The pattern seemed so simple, and the pictures made the purse look so cute, and I had found this gorgeous print that practically screamed purse. But, I should have seen the warning signs when I couldn't read the pattern. It was written in German. I think. Something definitely not English.

The sewing instructions were in English, so I thought that not needing to read the pattern would make it OK. First, I cut out all my pieces for the body and the straps.

I folded the straps inward, and then stitched the edges.

I then stitched down the middle of the straps. Big mistake.

See those rough edges? This is before I learned to turn under my seams and iron them before stitching. Now it looks like a 7th-grade home-ec project gone horribly, horribly wrong.

From a distance, they don't look so bad. I don't know what was up with the camera, but those straps definitely don't look like they came from the same bolt of fabric. I promise, though--they did!

I connected the upper part of the purse with the lower part of the purse. This, again, is where it went horribly wrong. Because I couldn't read the pattern, I didn't know that I was sewing it in upside down and wrong-side out!

There I am, stitching the straps in. Why didn't I catch this?

The finished product. Sure, it looks kind of cute, but think about how much cuter it could have been had there not been that weirdness down at the bottom. Good thing I've got a good bit of leftover fabric, so that I can have a do-over.

Live and learn, as my mother always told me. And, in the words of my first grade teacher who was quite discouraged by my leaning 'L's, "practice makes perfect".

Toodles!