Congrats to yesterday’s winner, Rhonda Best, on winning Day 5’s daily giveaway! We will be in contact so that you can claim your prize.
It’s Day Six of National Sewing Month! Don’t forget to visit Seams and Scissors every day to find daily giveaway opportunities and sewing ideas! To enter today’s daily giveaway, find the contest rules and leave a comment below. Also look out below for details on how to enter our National Sewing Month grand prize that includes a BERNINA 215 Sewing Machine! Too see the daily blog posts, projects of the day, and more National Sewing Month details, click here.
Today’s National Sewing Month post is brought to you by Judith from Cocojude!
My name is Jude and I have been blogging at cocojude.wordpress.com since the end of 2012. I tend to flit around different crafts as the mood takes me, but I mostly enjoy sewing, crochet and jewellery making. I came up with this great little sewing project especially for the Seams and Scissors blog – I hope you like it.
The idea for my pack away bag came from a really useful bag I was given as a present a few years ago, and I finally got around to trying to replicate it. It is surprisingly easy, and and doesn’t require masses of equipment. These fold away bags are small enough to bung in your handbag, and very useful when I go to visit my family in Wales (where you have to pay for plastic bags).
Ingredients
- Cotton fabric (a nice, thick good quality one is recommended. My bag is made from some very retro old curtains)
- Cotton thread
- Sewing machine
- Pins
- Sharp scissors for cutting fabric
Recipe
To make the main body of the bag
- Measure and cut a piece of fabric to 44cm by 70cm.
- Hem the top edge, fold in half width ways and sew around the bottom and open side. Zig zag the edges for a tidy finish.
- To make the straps, cut out two strips of fabric, each measuring 60cm by 9cm.
- Fold in half length ways, right sides together, and sew down the length. Turn the right way out and iron flat.
- Turn the bag inside out, and sew the straps securely into place, by sewing backwards and forwards a few times. Make sure they are evenly spaced!
To make the mini pack bag
- Cut out two rectangles of fabric – one measuring 13cm by 16cm, and the other one 13cm by 22cm. Hem the top edge of both rectangles.
- Lay the bigger rectangle right side up on your workspace. Fold the hemmed edge to make a 5cm flap.
- Right sides together, lay the smaller rectangle on top.
- Pin everything into place and then sew around both edges and the bottom. Zig zag the edges for neatness.
Assembling the pack a bag
- Turn both the big bag and the mini bag inside out. Stitch the bottom of mini bag to the bottom of the big bag.
- Ta da! Your bag is now finished! To pack it away, all you need to do is stuff the big bag into the mini pack bag.
Why not check out another of my tutorials, suitable for beginner sewists? – How to make self drafted pyjama trousers.
Be sure to see all of the projects and ideas available on Cocojude right here!
Also remember to check out the Project of the Day right here!
To enter the daily giveaway, leave a comment below telling us:
Do you remember the color your first backpack?
Official Rules for Daily Contest
- There is a maximum of one entry per person. The entry will be based upon a comment left on this blog post. Duplicate comments will be deleted and are not tallied.
- Winner will be selected at random from the comments on this blog post below.
- You have until tonight, September 6th, 2014 at 11:59p EST to leave your comment on this post. Comments posted after that will not be counted.
- Contest open to anyone 18+ in US and/or Canada.
Enter here for the National Sewing Month 2014 Grand Prize.
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