My Travels with Miranda

A fortnight ago I had the pleasure of making a business trip cross-country with a new acquaintance. By the end of the 6-hour plane ride, I knew we were going to be fast friends.
The next couple of days at the presentation and during the trade show we were on our way to a life-long friendship.

A lot of you know Joan Hawley, of Lazy Girls Design. I have long admired her bag designs visually and follow her very informative blog every Monday morning. However I had never had my hands on one of her designs to use.

I'm by nature an impatient and demanding bag user. I want a bag to have everything I need, whenever I need it with a minimum of rooting around. I want it to be able to carry all my reading and writing materials, my iPhone, second pair of glasses, wallet, passport case, camera... the list is infinite. When I want anything I want it fast. I want to be able to put down the bag and have her stand up by herself. And above all I don't want the shape of the bag to distribute the weight so badly that my arm is sheared off at the shoulder when carrying it. Miranda by far exceeded all my demands and even anticipated a few I didn't realize I had.


Stuffed!: iPhone, wallet, glass case, my idea corral (see "Stripes Rule!" post), quilting magazines , two books, travel pillow, passport case, and a Runaround bag you can't see because of the angle.

Joan had made me a Miranda Day Bag using the sienna & black colorway of my Sketchbook fabric line that debuts at the coming Spring Quilt Market. We were doing this with the idea of co-promotion at the trade show I was traveling to.

I was carefully wrapping up Miranda into my suitcase when I took a closer look at her and realized that she looked perfect for that long plane ride. So I unstuffed my usual bag and arranged everything into Miranda. Already I could tell Miranda was not just another pretty face. Here was a bag that knew what it took to go the distance.

As it turned out we had an extremely productive and satisfying trip. Miranda garnered compliments all the days we were there and has continued to do so back on the home turf accompanying me on my shopping expeditions. She can even carry my 12" Macbook!


Back at home at the studio meditating upon a successful trip.

And Miranda also loves her little sister Runaround which she carried lovingly and safely all the way across the USA and back. Check out the zipper and thread tutorials Joan has posted starring Runaround also in Sketchbook fabrics on Joan's Lazy Girls Design blog.

And for the readers among you:

You can see this is one of the books that I carried on the plane with me.
Mauve: How one man invented a color that changed the world by Simon Garfield.
Check out the review on Amazon for details. It's a real page-turner for anyone concerned with color. I whipped right through and so has Pamela, my dedicated UrbanAmish pupil. (And she doesn't even get extra credit for it.)

As background for the book shot I used Pamela's current Color Wheel quilt project.
Visit her website if you haven't yet. She has some very exciting color ideas too. (See sidebar for link.)