Something I Learned

 One of my favorite possessions is a good bag. We have quite a stash of re-usable bags. I use them to take to the grocery store, to carry stuff on my stroller when I walk to the Church for various reasons, to store knitting projects, and many other uses.  

When we travel or when we used to go on vacations for a brief shiny time in our lives (but not  today when no vacations seem wise), unlike some people who buy a tee shirt or a baseball cap or a little pottery curio, I would often buy a one dollar reusable bag at a grocery story as a memento of the trip.  Once when we came south and stopped at Piggly Wiggly, I found one of their bags. (Now we live right next door, almost, to Piggly Wiggly and have an anniversary bag.)  In Oregon I found a Grocery Outlet bag, and several other cool bags that, while very desirable and pleasing, did not have the name of the store on them so I cannot remember the store by name. 

We have a big bag of bags, much to the chagrin of some members of the household who are more minimalist than I am!! Well, I won't need to purchase any more bags unless: 1. they are canvas,  2. they have a zipper closure, and 3. they have a nice design commemorating the place I found them!

One of the plastic reusable bags recently started to come un-sewn at the top of one "corner".  I was sure I could mend it, so I did.

On this first corner that I mended, I forgot that you cannot sew plastic, even woven plastic, with a tight fine stitch. It cuts the plastic to shreds.  Well, it did not quite wreck the bag this time, but it is only a matter of time.  You can see that also I did not have the binding in a good position when sewing.  Even though the binding is now attached, I would call this seam a "fail".

After the first failure, I noticed another corner at the top of the bag that needed attention.  On this bag I did lengthen the stitch and was pretty happy with the way the sewing turned out and have some confidence that the bag will survive for more years.

What did I learn you ask?  Well, that I should ALWAYS have my eyes open and my brain in gear before I start any project.  The results will not be so variable, I think!