I’ve been wrestling with a very large t-shirt quilt for several weeks now but I’m finally just about finished and ready to move on to other projects. Christmas is only weeks away and I was asked to make a nurse/doctor bag for my niece by my mom. Apparently one of my nieces asked for a Pogo stick for Christmas so my mom thought her sister should have a medical kit handy. My mom is a nurse so she was able to find the tools necessary to make a well stocked nurse/doctor bag. She just needed a bag.
I found a pattern for a rounded purse which I thought looked like the old time-y doctors bags and Joann’s had their patterns on sale for $1.99 so that’s where I started.
I haven’t followed a sewing pattern in a while so it was rough. Plus I really don’t like to follow those directions because I always seem to have a slight modification that I want to make and then things don’t go well. With this pattern, I wanted to change the handle. I couldn’t find just the right leather type handle that I wanted so I had to use a set of wooden handles. A little weird I know, but I was trying to take some shortcuts.
There was some pinning and stabbing. I’m not gonna lie, I wanted to quit after the first side. I re-pinned this thing about 4 times because I couldn’t get it just right. But I kept at it and got the sides on. Then the lining had to be added.
I actually had to sew it in by hand so that it would attach to the zipper.
And the finished bag. It’s not the prettiest thing in the world but I think it will do.
Mom wanted a caduceus (I learned a new word there) on the side so I found one on the internet and tried out those iron-on transfer sheets. Since the bag was dark colored, I had to get the ones made especially for transferring onto dark colored fabrics as most are made to use on white or light colored t-shirts. I learned all kinds of new things with this project. Who knows; maybe my niece will learn all kinds of new things with her medical kit and decide to become a nurse someday. Mom would definitely love that.