Japanese Knot Bag

I came across Helen (a fellow Kiwi crafter) on Stitching Fingers, and then Sharon linked to this great pattern Helen has offered on her blog. She calls it a Japanese knot bag. I have also seen these kind of bags referred to as 'wristlets'. Well Of course I had to do one in CQ, and thought a tone on tone would be nice. Below is my embellished front. I used fabric from a baggie that my swap sister, Lorenza, sent me, and also some fabbie that my mum bought me.
And here is the finished product. This is the most technical I have ever got with sewing a bag together. I followed the instructions, made a proper separate lining and everything. The bag is fully reversible. The only change I made to Helen's instructions was that I left a slit in the side on one of the handles to turn the bag, rather than through the top of a handle. There is just to much CQ bulk to pull it through that small gap.
I used the heavy grade fusible lining to give the (circular) base some stability.
Here is the lining. No stitching showing!! The back is plain blue.
And finally the bag as you would wear it, modelled by the ever compliant Ben.
The base is about 15cm diameter, and if the front was a square it would be approx 8". It is a quite reasonable size, more than adequate for a night out. I would actually like to try and make a smaller one, but the smaller it gets, the harder an embellished bag would be to turn out