Travel Handmade

This post is part of the Travel Handmade series, for more great travel bag posts click here!

As part of the Travel Handmade series leading up to The Sewing Summit I decided to leap blindly into the world of bag making and pattern following.  You should know that my proficiency in both is less than sufficient.

I cruised the Internet and opted for a tote bag pattern from Alicia Paulson.  Considering I waited to the last second possible to actually start making the dern thing, I searched through my fabric stash to find something tote bag worthy.

And settled on this Ruby Star Rising fabric from Melody Miller for Kokka from last year.  The pattern calls for quilting cotton and this fabric is a medium weight cotton and linen blend.  I figured it would stand up to the wear and tear of a tote bag better than quilting cotton.  And I crossed my fingers that it didn't make the bag construction more difficult than necessary.

Luckily for me the linen/cotton blend worked well!

This pattern was easy enough for this pattern-phobe to follow.  It was laden with photos for every step of the process. 

And I'm pretty dang happy with the result.

Look!  I even sewed pin tucks!

Now, if you've looked closely at these photos you'll see that the printed fabric is up-side-down for most portions of the bag.  A mention or reminder for directional fabrics would have been helpful in the pattern instructions.   And if I were to make this tote again I would probably make the handles longer.  The bag finishes at about 11" (28cm) wide, 13" (33cm) tall, and 8" (20½cm) deep, with 16" (40½cm) straps.  At that length the bag is primarily for hand holding and I think I would prefer to fling it over my shoulder.

That being said, I enjoyed making this bag and love the finished results.  From start to finish this project took just over an hour to make and I think the results are polished and professional looking. 

Even if the tea pots and tea cups are up-side-down!

-dana