Don't forget the color.

As anyone who knows me knows I love color. All my walls in my house are painted bright vibrant colors like apple green, Caribbean blue and bright orange. I get so inspired by layers of texture piled with colors of all hues and shades. I search out vintage pieces with that color I crave to reinvent into something a little over the top and vibrant. Like this rag rug placemat I found at my local thrift store. Some of you may have seen my art bag but I decided to let you all know a little more about it since it will appear in the next issue of Cloth Paper Scissors in the muse flash section. That makes me as happy as a giant rainbow.

I created this bag with a standard placemat that I folded in half and then crocheted the sides in the end loops. I added straps by simply cutting a small hole on each side of the bag and tying long pieces of fabric strips and even a vintage Peruvian belt as handles. I then took more strips of fabric and ran them through holes in the bottom and to the handles to create fringe. I hung some ATC's from the fringe and a few supplies like a scissors, sharpie, wire and ruler from the strap fringe so I am never without these staples of my craft arsenal. The bag is big enough to fit a nice assortment of supplies on a trip so I can journal on the go.

The wonderful color in the placemat also made for a nice background for a few of my new pendants that are now at Persimmons!