Bookish Bag

A birthday gift for someone who always has a lot to carry (literally and figuratively):

I was inspired by this tutorial, but made mine a little larger because I wanted it to accomodate books in addition to being handbag:

I was determined to have the topstitching along the front and back, but I must have ripped it out 8 times before I gave up that dream. I'm guessing it had something to do with the way the wales of the corduroy fed through the feed dogs, but I could NOT sew a straight line. So I stitched something like it by hand with embroidery floss.

Pockets for pencils and one for a gadget. I put some ribbon on the top of a couple pockets after I realized they blended in with the lining so well, they became invisible.

And a big pocket on the other side for...stuff.