I am an ELF!

I have been filling orders for the holidays - so I can't post any pictures now!! All of my recent work must remain a secret until after Christmas is over. :)
P.S. We just got a new laptop (early Christmas present - THANKS BARB & PAT!) This is my first new laptop post.
P.S.S. Tomorrow the spa at the airport is hosting an art/gift/craft show in Civic Plaza (which means it's before security) and I'll have a table at it! It's from 3 - 6pm. Come by if there's anyone left on your Christmas list to buy for...or if you just like me a lot.
Ok one more P.S.: Enroute and the Hip and Handmade in Indy project was on the front page of the Indy Star Features section yesterday! Wooo hooooo

It was meant to be...

Kit went searching on the entire gigantic thing we know as the internet for a fabric that she loved that I could turn into a bag for her. She came up with this super neat print and emailed me a photo of a swatch. I opened the jpeg and about fell out my chair because guess who ALREADY HAD THAT FABRIC IN HER LIBRARY! Yup - I did. My mom had purchased it a while back and handed it over to me to make something with. And then Kit unknowingly picked it out of one bazillion options online! Thus, it was destined to be. I used it with another African inspired fabric that Kit got at an African festival. I re-purposed a woven leather belt for use as a handle. The inside has a couple of big pockets and a clip for her keyring.

Liz v2.0/Brenna/Lisa

Wanted to show you a few recent orders for customers that I hope are happy customers! :)

Enroute

The Meg James Design display was offically installed last night in Enroute Spa/Boutique at the airport. Keep an eye out for upcoming local press on the "Hip & Handmade in Indy" project!

Hip & Handmade in Indy @ Enroute Spa

Starting November 7th and continuing through the holidays, Meg James Design will have a collection of purses for sale at Enroute Spa, an environmentally friendly, holistic health-based day spa located in the new Indianapolis Airport. (Who knew there was a spa at the airport??)

I met the super energetic and fun owner of the spa, Erin, at the Red Event where I had a booth. She shared with me her big cool idea to start "Hip and Handmade in Indy" at her spa where local designers and their creations, like bags and jewelry, would be featured. Her idea was sparked by her mission to keep spa operations as green as possible. For example: They don't buy soap from a big soap company; they get it from a local person who makes soap which helps reduce their carbon footprint by not utilizing transportation that would carry the soap long distances to reach the spa. Featuring local artisans in her shop will follow this same principle, and it will also give travelers a unique perspective of the flavor of our city as they pass through the airport.

Next time you are there, check it out in Concourse B :) Below are a couple of new items that will be included in the collection.

The latest...

Bold, graphic upholstery weight print with floral interior, pockets, snap closure. The floral interior fabric was found at an antique store in Sullivan, Illinois.

A mix of vintage reproductions and newer fabrics, antique button embellishment, reinforced pink and gold ribbon handle, interior pockets, snap closure.

It emerged from my scrap pile...

At work, I have had the pleasure of doing TWO projects with one of the most awesome clients a designer could ask for. Her name is Patty - she knows what she wants, she knows what she likes, she's as nice as can be, and she's waaay too much fun! We first met about two years ago when her company looking for a new office, and we are now in the midst of an expansion project for a new business unit they have acquired. When I told Patty that I make purses, she immediately requested a big ole bag made out of everything in my scrap pile (see - I told you she was fun).

P.S. the picture above isn't Patty - it's my mom - she's just modeling Patty's creation. :)

The Red Event

Knoll/RJE (621 E Ohio St - downtown) is hosting an artisan fair that raises money for The Little Red Door Cancer Agency on October 8th from 5 - 8pm, and I will have a booth! I've been trying to crank out some inventory for it. Here is some of the latest! Also, a lot of the bags in the slideshow to the right will be for sale. Come down and visit me and see a lot of cool stuff for sale. And if you spend money, you help fight cancer! It's a win-win!

The Colts, some purses and a beer

That pretty much sums up my Sunday afternoon! The reddish orange/blue/white one was made from another tablecloth I found at an antique store. The blue and gold one is fabric found for me by my sister-in-law Amy (the one with the Midland booth) who is a fabulous fabric scout.

Personal Best 5 & The Ripple Effect

Back in August, my younger sister Kerry, Brian James, Brian Murray (our new brother-in-law!), and I participated in a little run through Broad Ripple called the Personal Best 5. 5 miles, as you can tell by the name, and we all did it in a personal best time!

And last weekend, Brian and I ran in The Ripple Effect, another little run through Broad Ripple - 4 miles long. We ran together, finishing with a new personal best pace of 8:50/mile. Weehoooo I had tired legs after that one.

For Jenny

I did two fun things in my craft room today! First, I set up my brand new cutting table (a birthday present from my mom and pop). It's niiiiiiiiice. :)

Then, I made Jenny's new purse! Pink is her favorite color.

Quid Pro Quo

My friend Briana (who happens to be the fabulous jewelry designer linked down on the right in the list of fun stuff) made me the coolest ring ever, shown here (and please ignore my manhand):

In return, I made her a purse that I hope matches its level of awesomeness! She picked out the exterior fabric (real wool - super soft!), she wanted a flap, some flare, and a long braided handle. And here's the finished product:

The braided strap is long so the bag can be carried messenger style. It also has two big pockets on the inside (and a label - oh yeah). :) The two flowers on the front are "yo-yo's" - this is an old sewing technique that my mom was bustin out last weekend on the boat in Illinois. She taught me how to make them and they were perfect for this!

Hope you like it, Briana, and thanks again for the cool ring!

Labels! I am so official.

So it's been one bazillion years since I've posted anything! Things unrelated to the world of crafts have been very hectic for the last month or so. I was in two weddings this month which was a ton of fun and, of course, took up a lot of my weekend sewing time. Even thought I haven't made many new creations over the last month, there have been some fun developments at meg james design!
First and foremost - I got a new sewing machine for my birthday from Brian. The thing is amazing. I had been using a super sturdy and reliable Singer 99K that my mom gave me awhile back. It did the trick, but this new machine does MORE tricks! It threads itself, the bobbin just plops in and is ready go, it has a ton of stitches to choose from, it came with a bunch of feet, the list goes on and on. It's a Brother machine - Project Runway Limited Edition. Consumer reports gave it a great review (thanks for pointing it out to me, Barb!) and the price could not be beat! My production time just got cut by at least a third with all these new capabilites.
Cool thing #2 would be the photo above (horrible photo courtesy of my iPhone). I had labels stitched that say "meg james design" so my bags/pillows/pouches are officially branded! Officially official. :)
Anyway, just wanted to let you know that I'm ready to rock and roll again and keep your eye out for new stuff on the blog!

R.A.I.N.

Brian and his brother, Chris, have been training for the past 4 months for a big bike race called RAIN (it stands for Ride Across INdiana). Hence the name, the race goes aross Indiana from Terre Haute to Richmond on Route 40 - a total of 160 miles!! That's insane. I can't imagine riding a bike for even half that long. Anyway, the race was today and they both killed it!! It started at 7am, and they crossed the finish line a little before 5pm. Under 10 hours! We made it to the finish line just in time to watch them cross it. And check out the awesome sign Barb is holding - Amy made it to cheer them on...love it!

A little flare!

One of my friends at work, Briana, commissioned a purse and requested that it have some type of flap closure. I decided to experiment first before I made hers, and this is what I ended up with! I love it - and I dressed up the flap with a little flare. I created the little flower/rosette guy by loosely folding and shaping a long strip of the fabric and then stitching it in place. Fun! This is more vintage fabric from my mom - it wasn't my favorite at first, but the more I've looked at it, the more I love it! My mom said she could picture my dad's mom standing in her kitchen in a shift dress made out of material like this back in the day. Oh, and I didn't take a picture of the lining, but it's a green and blue and tan and white stripey linen that really pops. I think this style would also work really well as a messenger bag with a longer shoulder strap - so I will work on that next for you Kerry! :)

Raffle Purse

Business Furniture is having an event tonight to re-cap what went on at NeoCon (a big week long convention/trade show in Chicago for designers and manufacturers of everything interior design related) since a lot designers couldn't make the trip this year. They are having a raffle with lots of prizes, and one will be a Meg James purse! I put together a little tag with the blog site on the back.

Another Vintage Pouch

I thought I'd post this little guy because my craftsmanship greatly improved from first pouch to second pouch! That's usually how it goes - which is why I usually keep the first of something that I make because it's never as good as the rest! This one will be part of the Midland collection. I made a lot of progress on the collection this weekend, until I broke the needle on my sewing machine this afternoon. Ooooops.

I got love for the pouch!

While sorting through a bunch of my old fabric, I came across a plastic bag full of scraps that I remember receiving from my mom around the time I moved out of the house. Upon further investigation, I found that the bag contained some of my first EVER sewing projects - we're talking like 'I'm 8 years old and my mom is teaching me how to use her sewing machine' type projects. I found a small stack of squares that were each made of several long skinny rectangles of mis-matched vintage fabrics pieced together. After laughing at how great some of the old prints are, I realized that they would make perfect little pouches sewed together with some lining and a zipper! Here are a couple photos of one - and yes, those are pink bunny rabbits. Very happy pink bunny rabbits. There will be more of these down at Midland in a couple weeks!

Mo's Purse

I think my favorite part of Mo's purse was the bright orange lining fabric - fun!

A couple of recent creations...

This purse was a present for my mom, but it wasn't a surprise because she gave me the orange wool that it's made out of and picked out the button from her hugely gigantic collection of buttons. I did, however, throw in a little spice that she wasn't expecting with the pink and yellow flowers and lime green stitching!





I made this pillow as a baby gift for Brad and Michelle's baby girl, Harper. It was my first venture into the world of how to properly sew a zipper into something, which I must say was not as hard as I imagined it would be!




Here is my latest purse - I think I'll keep this one for myself :) I made it out of a super cool vintage tablecloth that I found at Midland that was just perfect for a purse. It also had this really neat detail on the reverse - the text from when the fabric was printed back in the day. I decided to trim off all the finished edges and weave them into a handle so the the words would be visible.

Meet the Moose Man

Moose is our yellow lab - he'll be three years old in the fall. Here he is enjoying the springtime air in the backyard. He looks relaxed, but don't let that fool you. He is secretly planning a surprise spaz attack on the tennis ball sitting two feet away.

This a more realistic depiction of what Moose is like! This one was taken after a good round of fetch out at the farm.

hi!

So this is my first post - thanks for checking it out!

Last night, Brian drank a beer out of a glass and when he finished it, this is what was at the bottom of the glass: