We had a recent family wedding that necessitated a cross country road trip covering 2300km (1430 miles), it also needed a new bag.
Like many things, it started with shoes. I have had thee cream floral satin shoes which I was given for my birthday in what has come to be known as the pandemic before times… like just before, I didn’t have a chance to wear them. So when presented with a wedding and an opportunity to frock up, I decided that this was the perfect time to wear them. But I didn’t have the right bag and shopping is really annoying (I currently have a love/hate relationship with shopping; once I used to love it, now not so much)…
So I decided on the All the Things Tote from Knot and Thread Design.
But Katie, why would you take a tote bag to a wedding?
Because, in the bag I knew I was going to end up with what would usually be in the pockets of the people around me (which this time for something different included my sister). I also knew that there was going to be a *lot* of time between the ceremony and the reception and we were going to be at the venue for the bit in the middle. I needed my security blanket hand sewing, so I needed somewhere to keep it which also kind of looked like it belonged at a wedding.
Fabric Choices
For this project I made the decision to not use the recommended fabrics – this would come back to bite me later, but the things we do for the vibe. I used satin. Cream satin. On this were some silk rectangles I had fused down for a little interest and colour, it was then straight line quilted with hot pink thread. It was slippery (the walking foot helped with that), and it frayed like a … thing. Glue helped with that, and scissors.
The Construction – lessons in reading, comprehending and acting (in that order)
The pattern is really well written and put together – did I read it all and not make mistakes? nope. The backing fabric was the biggest example of this. Did I make the decision to jump in and just do what I think the pattern said? Yes. Was that what I needed to do? No. Let’s just cut to the chase. I rebelled and then needed to do some fixing – but that’s all part of the process.
Internally there is blue satin as the lining, this was quilted for the end pieces, but not in the main bag fabric – where I had quilted it with another cotton lining. I then interfaced the blue lining fabric and sewed it to the backing of the main bag (if that all makes sense). I also shortened the pattern. The bag itself is taller by about 2 inches, but this wasn’t going to quite fit what I was thinking so I chopped it all down before sewing the whole thing together.
The handles don’t have the webbing in them, that was more of a product of not being able to source the webbing easily (I have some now for the next one, which there will be), and being on a tight timeframe.
All in all it worked well.
Overall Thoughts
Will I make this again – yes. I have plans for many more and a couple in some stashed and favoured precious fabric. It is a relatively easy make, well structured and comes in three sizes (this is the smallest, and my changes made it smaller again. Totally recommend the pattern.
