This past Saturday morning I woke up needing to sew a quick birthday present for my daughter's friend. Chloe was getting ready for a princess birthday party. We already had a small gift, but my daughter wanted me to make a personalized bag for her to bring that gift in.
I quickly scanned the {crafty little things to sew} page in the SewCanShe archives and found the Poochie Bag tutorial by The Happy Zombie, which comes very highly recommended by my Aunt, but I had never made before.
And of course, Chloe insisted that the bag include the letter 'L' (the first letter of her friend's name), so we decided it would be a good time to play with our Slice Cutter too. Using the Slice Cutter, you apply fusible web to your fabric, let the machine cut the design, and then it is all ready to fuse and stitch.
Here are the two pockets after I fused and stitched the applique and before I attached them to the bag. We used the 'Double Dutch' design card available for Slice. She liked the font included with this card and also picked out the layered bird design.
This is really a super little bag tutorial. Monica gives two different bottom corner options to customize the shape of the bag, and really thinks of everything you might need. It's a great start if you want to learn how to make bags and purses.
Quick Tip: The tutorial is written to use 3 fat quarters per bag. If you are using regular yardage instead of fat quarters (like I was), then when you cut out the straps, don't cut 4 strips that are 22'' long. Instead cut 2 strips 44'' long. This will save you the step of sewing those strips together. :)
I found the fabrics for this bag at my local quilt shop. If you love them, I'm cutting all that's left into kits for the SewCanShe Shop. {click here}
Happy sewing!
