Sewing - Tote Bag

Since I turned in my thesis on Monday, I've had a bunch of extra time on my hands - the perfect opportunity to explore new hobbies.  On my last trip home, my grandma gave me a sewing machine so I can make curtains for my new apartment (more on that another time), and a ton of this awesome printed canvas fabric.  I LOVE the bold, crazy pattern which I think is reminiscent of something I would spend a fortune on at Anthropologie.  Naturally, I decided that this fabric would make excellent curtains; maybe paired with a solid red or blue to tone down the loud pattern a bit. 

But, alas, The Biochemist hated my new fabric.  HATED it.  I admit that it is a little on the bold side, but it's not that bad...is it? Nonetheless, I decided to let him have his say and we chose a nice solid burgundy for the curtains instead.  But what to do with all this print?

Truthfully, I think it might make better tote bags than curtains.  The first bag I made was a complete fail.  My plan was to pleat the top of the bag and sew a strip over the top to finish it but I stupidly didn't account for the shortening of the fabric cased by the pleating and the end result was an excessively long bag with a tiny opening, barely large enough for my hand.  My second attempt was a little better - I cut a long, wide strip and planned to fold it in half and sew up the sides.  However, I tried to be creative and flatten the bottom of the bag but instead, just made the whole thing look kind of wonky. 

This is my third and final (for now) attempt.  And it was a success!  I out each side, allowing about a half an inch seam allowance on the bottom ad sides and four inches on top to fold over for the top hem. A four inch wide strip makes up the bottom and sides. The handles were made by sewing long strips into tubes, inverting them, and stitching over the top to keep them flat.  They were sewn into the top hem, flipped up, and double stitched into place.  

The process turned out to be quite easy but I did break 5 needles during the process. 5.  That's a lot.  I think I was pulling the fabric through a little too fast...plus by the time I was double stitching the the handles in place, the fabric was quite thick.

This one is a Christmas present for my friend, M, but I plan to make at least one more for myself at some point.   It was a fun, and relatively easy project.  I highly recommend starting with something simple like this tote-bag of you want to get into sewing.  After making this bag, making the solid burgundy curtains was a breeze.