Thursday 3 September 2015

Summer Swap Tote Bag - A Finish

This year the Modern Quilters Ireland group had a summer swap. We've been making tote bags for each other, big enough to hold a magazine and room for a crafty project or two!  This is due to be delivered to my swap partner today so I thought I'd share some photos!


My swap partner loves bright happy fabrics and didn't have too many dislikes so I had a lot of free reign in coming up with something that she would like and would be in the spirit of modern quilting.  I knew I wanted to have a nice front to the bag and thought about paper pieced stars.  My original idea was to have 4 snall stars on one side and 1 big one on the back and then I had a rethink.  I thought I might be over complicating things.


Thumbing through some old editions of Quilt Now I spotted Laura Hartrich's Goodnight, Love you bed quilt. I love this quilt and think the clever way of using drunkards path for the heart and letters is really visually interesting.  I chose Noodlehead's Super tote as the basis for the bag as it offered a really lovley big pocket on the front of the bag.  Looking at the maths to make this fit would mean really small drunkards path blocks so I made them all triangles instead!


I pulled from scraps and have fabrics in here from my Lost in London and most recent swoon quilt.  this was so much fun I decided to make a second pocket for the back and appliqued the O and E to make this a bit easier and faster to make.



The super tote pattern has a pocket on one side only but it was really easy to just make 2!  I loved this pattern - it is really well written and once all the interfacing is ironed on it sews together quickly.


I had the idea of quilting in some text to have this say Love...summer holidays, friendship, family, sunshine...  I think I may need to practice quilt writing a little bit more as it was not quite as smooth as I had envisioned!


I wanted the bag to be slouchy and not too stiff so the heart got some gentle wiggling , enough to keep the layers in place!


So here you have it!  My take on a summer tote bag!  There are rumours of an Indian summer so my swap partner may get to use it yet!


Linking up to the Friday Finishes!

15 comments:

  1. Hi Ruth! What a beautiful tote! Looks so adorable with the slightly fluffy quilting. I love your fabric choises and the letters with the heart are super! x Teje

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  2. What a sweet gift and great inspiration. I think the words look really good and make it even more summery.

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  3. What a great source of inspiration for a modern tote bag! It looks great and the small modifications make a lot of sense to me.

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  4. What a good idea for a swap: beautiful and useful with it! Your scrappy heart worked out well, and I like the letters on the back too.

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  5. first of all, that bag is adorable. I just love it, and anyone would be happy to receive it.
    Machines.... the more they do, the more trouble they get into. Tension is an ongoing pain in the neck.
    You know how threads are wound tells you how to seat them I guess. So many reasons why a machine won't do what we ask of it. If I could just find a great mechanic... so many questions. LeeAnna

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  6. So cute! You have a very lucky swap partner.

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  7. What a great tote. Your partner is lucky to have you sewing for her. Thanks for tip on the Noodlehead pattern.

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  8. Your swap partner must be so delighted Ruth! I love the way you translated the ideas fro the big quilt onto this bag! And the text quilting makes it all the sweeter too.

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  9. Oh it's so sweet! And I love the original quilt too, isn't it a fun pattern!

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  10. What a lovely tote! A sweet take on that quilt and it works beautifully on your tote. Your swap partner is going to be delighted.

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  11. That's a lovely bag Ruth. I just remembered to post my tote bag off this morning to my swap partner!

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  12. It's just darling! You have a lucky partner, and I'm looking forward to seeing what you received from another.

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  13. What a clever idea - I love your adaptation of the original pattern; it makes such a great bag.

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  14. Fun use of pattern and I hope your partner likes it!

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  15. I just ran across this project today and it is so cute! I love the way you adapted my quilt. Thanks so much for sharing.

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