Amusing MJ

This bag has to be one of my all time favorite sewing projects.  It was one of my first ventures into sewing other than my burp cloths.  I wanted to hand-make some of my bridesmaid gifts for my wedding, so I made 5 tote bags (I’ll have to share that later) and 10 little makeup bags.  The makeup bags were for my bridesmaids and house party and since I was making 10 of them, I didn’t make myself an extra.  Well, now its almost a year later and I wanted one, so I decided to make one for myself and share the process with y’all. Here is the bag:

And here is a pic of them all lined up and filled with goodies for my bridal party:

When I got started on this project I got some great help and fabulous fabric from Sarah’s Fabrics in Lawrence, KS.  If you live in Kansas City or Lawrence I highly recommend them… they are a great little shop on Mass St.  The gray and white fabric came from there.

Alright, on to the how to, here is what you need:

• 2- 10″ x 7″ rectangles of patterned fabric
• 2- 10″ x 7″ rectangles of solid print
• 2- 10″ x 7″ of interfacing (I used a medium weight iron on interfacing it makes the bags stiffer so they will sit up on their own)
• a zipper that is longer than 10″
• 1- 1.5″ x 4″ strip of fabric the same color as your zipper. (I show two below… but you only really need one, I just like to have extra in case I goof)
• an iron
• a sewing machine
• thread

First up we will prep the zipper.  I love the way this looks on the final bag, it gives the little colored stoppers at the end of each zipper.  Take your 1.5″x4″ strip of fabric and fold it ‘hot dog style’ down the middle, and run the iron over it so you have a seam in the middle. Then fold each edge in towards the crease you just made with the iron.  Now fold it in half on that crease so that your edges are all on the inside.  This is a hard step to explain, so I have a picture (I don’t have a picture with the iron because I don’t have three hands, but picture me running an iron over the fabric between each step):

Now take your zipper and cut off the end of it (sorry for the weird lighting on this one… i’m still mastering the whole photography thing):

Now tuck that end of the zipper in between the two folded in sides of your small piece of fabric towards one end of that fabric and sew a line of stitching across it, then cut off the excess.  You’ll use that other half for the other end of the zipper.  Now it should look like this:

Cut your zipper off at the other end about an inch shorter than your bag (approx 9″)

And sew the other half of your small piece of fabric onto this end of the zipper, repeating the same process. You should now have a zipper that looks a lot like this:

Alright, set that to the side and grab your inside fabric pieces (solid color) and the interfacing and follow your instructions on attachment, mine you simply iron on, making sure the dotted side faces the fabric you are fusing it to.  If your fabric has a good side and a bad side, make sure you are attaching the interfacing to the ‘bad side’. It will look like this when it is finished:

Now comes what I think is the trickiest part of this project, figuring out which way which fabrics go! I’ve shown you pictures of each step so hopefully this will be easier for you guys! Place your outside fabric (the gray and white), good side up, then the zipper upside down and about 1/2 of the way zipped up and centered between the fabrics (there will be about 1/2 inch overhang on each side), then the inside piece good side down, which means the interfacing will be face up. I didn’t use a zipper foot (mostly because I’m lazy, but also because I don’t know how).  But no worries… its easy to get around.

Put it in the machine like I have it laid out above, and stitch down the right side of that zipper until you get to the actual zipper part. Then with your needle down through the fabric so it doesn’t move, lift up your presser foot, slip your hand in between the layers of fabric and move the actual zipper up and around the presser foot (the needle part) so that you can sew through the rest of the zipper (if you don’t the presser foot will run over the zipper and move your seam off of the fabric…  trust me).

Now your bag should have one side attached to the zipper, like this:

Move your zipper halfway up again, and get ready to attach the other side, like before your outside fabric goes face up on the bottom, and the solid color fabric  face down on the top, but you have to make sure your zipper is face down and the other side is sandwiched in between your new fabric, like this:

Now just repeat the process from before: sew halfway down, leave your needle in the fabric, lift the presser foot and move the zipper to the other side, and sew the rest of the way.

Now your bag should look alot like this:

I highly recommend ironing at this stage so that the seams next to the zipper are as flat as possible.  Once you’ve done that its time to seal up your bag.  IMPORTANT STEP!!! Make sure your zipper is at least partially unzipped.  You are about to seal up the other three sides of this, so if your zipper is zipped all the way up, it becomes VERY difficult to open a zipper from the inside and you will be very frustrated with yourself for forgetting this very simple step.  Just ask me how I know.

Now, fold the fabric so your outside pieces are facing each other (for mine this means my navy fabric is facing out) and sew all three remaining sides together.  Don’t forget to back stitch at the beginning and the end!

This should be one continuous line, when you get to the corners just leave your needle in the fabric, lift the presser foot and move your fabric until your next side is lined up. Once you are done, trim off any excess pieces (did I mention I’m bad at measuring and cutting so I frequently have sides that don’t line up perfectly?? Totally acceptable)

You have two choices now.  You can cut your corners off at an angle like we did for the burp cloths and then turn your piece through the zipper side… see aren’t you glad you left it partially unzipped? This will make it a rectangular pencil bag like this:

Or you can do another step like I did to make it stand up on its own and look a little more like a makeup bag. For this step, leave it inside out and take one corner and line up the seams so they are on top of each other like this:

Measure about an inch and a half up and stitch a line across it (again, sorry for the weird lighting on a few of these):

Then trim off your excess:

Rinse and repeat on your other corner, now when you turn your bag inside out, it looks like this:

And its the perfect size for makeup, jewelry, etc!