Main Fabric: Tomica Diecast Cars Trucks Machinery on Blue Licensed Fabric & Japanese Shinkansen Trains Tomy Licensed Fabric (Find-A-Fabric)
Lining Fabric: Riley Blake Confetti Cotton (Autumn, Tomato, Jade, Rain Forest)
Notions: Rasant col. X2000
My friends’ two boys love trains and vehicles and stuff so when I saw these two fabrics on Find-A-Fabric I ended up buying them with no particular project in mind. I thought about making them drawstring bags, but decided to make library bags instead. I found a tutorial for Australian library bags thinking they could use it for school, but then asked my SIL about my nieces’ school library bags and found out they are school themed haha. I think the two boys also go to a private school so they will probably need school themed bags as well. So I checked with their mum and she said that they could use the bags for other purposes. I guess like going to the public library or activity books and stuff? So I went ahead with the plan.
As per usual I found the tutorial but didn’t really read it. I was mostly after dimensions because I figured someone had already documented what works. So when I went to make it I realised it needed lining fabric and while I could have used the main fabric, I thought that would be a bit of a waste, so went through my stash and grabbed some matching solid quilting cottons. Thank you Ace Attorney Cushion Project, the project that keeps on giving lol. I didn’t have enough of a single colour for both sides but thought it might be fun to have two different colours. And honestly I think it came out pretty well.
I didn’t really follow the instructions since I have a preferred way of assembling this kind of bag. One new thing I did was use the Clover Loop Pressing Bars. The largest size luckily matched the handles. I didn’t interface the handles since the fabric was 4cm wide with 1cm seam allowance so I figured the seam allowance would provide the structure required. And I didn’t want to try turn interfaced handles inside out haha. The bars were everything I expected from them. I was able to position and straighten the seams before pressing and topstitching. I wonder if I can use them for larger handles if I do one side at a time 🤔
I made sure to match the handle lining colour to the inner lining colour, but I messed up and put the handles the wrong way. I only realised when I was pretty much up to the last step (topstitching the top of the bag), so thought hard about it and decided, it doesn’t matter 🤣 I guess up to now I’ve always used the same fabric for both sides of the handle so never had to think about the direction the handle was facing.
This was one of those projects that I knew would be fast to assemble but kept procrastinating on. So glad I managed to get it done well in advance of their birthdays. The plan is to put a book inside for each of them. The older one is getting P Is for Pterodactyl: The Worst Alphabet Book Ever, which is kinda a joke present to our friends as well, because they are gonna have so much fun (?) reading this with their son LOL. The younger one is born in September so I want to get him The First of Octember since October/November are quite soon after, which is a book I adored as a kid and besides it’s Dr Seuss so good for kids (and probably going to lose us points with our friends as well, I’m not sure how much parents like to read Dr Seuss to their kids).
Categories: Sewing
Leave a Reply