WandaLandQuilts
Making Memories Through Quilts
Week 7 – April 1 – 7, 2012 – Round Beach Tote
If you know me, you know I love bags! Zippered bags (like last week), purses, and tote bags of all kinds, but this was the first time I’ve made one of these. First of all – it’s got a round base! And grommets around the top to pull the cord through. I do remember my mother made a bunch of these when we were kids and we took them camping. I’m sure they got a lot of use in those days.
As I was reading through the directions, I realized that the bottom was just one piece of fabric. It wasn’t reinforced in way. So, if you put just one or two heavy things in the bag, they would practically poke right through the bottom and it would be more like a tube rather than a duffle kind of bag. I decided to make it two layers of fabric with a piece of mesh plastic in the bottom so it would hold its shape. This would also help when digging through the bag trying to find something. It also has 4 pockets on the outside, two large and two small. This would be nice to stick sunglasses, sunscreen, keys, and stuff like that.
For improvements, it might be nice to have at least one pocket with a zipper, but I’ll have to think on how to do that. Perhaps inside pockets the same as the outside pockets – just thinking about where to store money or ID. This particular fabric is an upholstery fabric so it’s a bit thicker and more sturdy than ordinary cotton fabric. I also think this would be nice made from pre-quilted fabric like what I used last week. Rather than using the mesh plastic in the bottom, maybe some stiff interfacing. It would sure be easier to sew. And the size, I would classify this one as XL, so I’ll have to work on downsizing the pattern, too.
Putting in the grommets was interesting to say the least. Of course there’s a cool tool that does this. (Don’t ya just love cool tools?) Well, it seemed pretty easy but it was a bit cumbersome. I’m sure I’ll get better with practice…so keep watching to see when I use this cool tool in the future.
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