My Mom's Birthday Present

So my mom had this skirt.
Colorful with tropical print.
She says it reminded her of her mission.
I've seen her wear it countless times.

One day we were visiting and as I'm going through a bin of her clothes headed for DI she walks out with her arm extended gazing at her skirt.

"I've got to say good-bye to this" she states simply. "It just isn't 'stylish' anymore. I've loved this skirt....It reminds me of my mission (in Dominican Republic) but.....would you want it?" she glances over hopeful that the skirt will live on in the family.

"No" I tell her honestly. "I like it, but it fits your personality better than it would fit mine- I don't think I would wear it." I am hopeful she will keep it if she likes it so much. Oh well if it's not "stylish".

She tosses it into the pile with a big sigh and says, "I just don't wear it anymore!" and with that walks quickly away to resist the temptation to pick it up again because we all know that once it touches all the other DI clothes that you can never retrieve it again. That's it. The end.

I looked at the skirt and realized that her birthday was next week and I didn't have a lot to spend....hmm.....,


I took it home, cut it up and made:

A BAG!

When I presented it to her, I realized she might not be sure what to feel about her old skirt being cut up- and she was a little sad but it passed (thankfully whew!) and she was so excited about her new bag she could bring her weights in to go to the gym! I'm so happy she liked it! 

A few facts:

Totally made up pattern- uh...yah- I was kind of naive.

It took me a really long time- because I was also learning how to use my sewing machine- which by the way has the most confusing bobbin loading- took me ONE HOUR to figure that out. I hope it never runs out of bobbin thread again. That would be nice.

I added a beaded lanyard type thing with a hook to latch her keys on which looked super cute and I'm sad I didn't get a picture- next time I go down I will have to take one just for memory's sake. 

This was my first ever project I completed (that wasn't a school assignment back in high school)!

Grant modeled it for me: