Working with Mozart

I finally persuaded Linda, sick with the flu after taking care of her sick son all week, to show me how to make a tote bag:

Doesn't it look straight out of store? A really fancy tote bag store? And look:

It's lined! Wouldn't you pay like, a hundred bucks for this?

The wild thing is that Linda totally intuited the whole thing. I thought she was going to show me some pattern and we'd follow the steps. But she just said, what size do you want? And points to various tote bags she's made by "figuring it out". Remember the movie "Amadeus"? She was like Mozart, just saying you'll want to do this...And I'd ask why and she'd say it's hard to explain but you'll see in the end..And so on. It was like that scene where Salieri has found some music Mozart is working on and Salieri marvels at the heavenly oboe note coming in from nowhere, follows the composition, and jealously deems Mozart's work brilliant. Like that, but instead I have a fabulous tote bag!

I'm hoping to make a few for a fundraiser--fortunately for me, I understood Linda's logic and hope to crank some out this weekend in various sizes. Wish me luck--