Weekend Maker!

This was my quick weekend project -

No pattern, I just went for it.  I emptied the rest of Zoey’s dog food into her covered storage tub, and was about to toss out the bag, and then thought better of it.

I decided to turn it into a grocery tote – and before The Hubster had even left for his archery competition shoot I had this bag on the cutting table, large ruler and rotary cutter in hand.

I should have taken photos of the whole process.  Because it was easy.  At the same time – you know how it is when you feel so driven to just do something that taking photos is the LAST thing on your mind?  Yes.  That was me.

Things I learned about working with the tarp-like fabric:  This stuff is SLIPPERY!

The next time I want to try a walking foot and see if that helps me get a straighter seam.  Right now, it’s like I was skating on butter.

The first thing I did was determine how tall I wanted the bag.  And I really didn’t measure, it was – Here is good – and try to get as straight a cut across the bag as I could where I wanted that cut to be.

This is a 40 lb bag of dog food, so it is a LARGE bag.

After cutting the height, I cut 2 straps at 3’’ wide (Everything is still in a “loop” at this point, I didn’t open the bag out flat, just using it as is.) and then a facing at about 4’’ wide.

My plan was to leave the boxed corners as is at the bottom of the bag to form the base of the bag, and the only thing I did was fold where I wanted to crease the bottom, and then top-stitched those folds so that the bag would stand flat.  There are no gussets or y-seams or inset pieces.

Once my pieces were cut, I washed them in the sink with dawn dish soap to remove any residual dog food smell and residue. Dry dog food is greasy.

Please do this – Or you’ll have all the dogs in the neighborhood following you down the street.  LOL!

For the handles – I decided on shoulder length, and folded the strap pieces the long way in 1/3’s, bringing the raw edges toward the center and overlapping slightly.  I sewed these down near the center with a straight stitch.  I’m not worried about the tarp fraying.

After stitching down the center (The walking foot would have helped greatly here I think) I top-stitched close to each folded edge.

I then finger creased one long edge of the  facing as a hem (toward the back side) and top stitched that edge.

From here it was simply pinning the handle ends where I wanted them to go, raw edges of handles to raw edges of top of bag with handles hanging on the right side of bag.  

Then I slid the facing ring piece over the top of everything with right sides together and stitched all the way around the top edge of the bag catching all layers.

Because the facing was the same circumference as the bag, it fit perfectly.

Then it was just a matter of turning the facing to the inside, top stitching close to the top of the bag, and then further down along the edge of the facing hem through all layers.

I know this is clear as mud without photos – but believe me. This bag took me less than 30 minutes to whip up.

And I used pink thread as that was what was in the machine.  LOL!

My new favorite tote bag!

This is a test – this is only a test – and it worked.  Zoey thinks I should be very proud of myself for being so frugally creative!

Another thing I would have done…..Leave the straps a bit longer – push them down further into the facing seam, so I could stitch a big X to secure the handles better through all layers.  Next time.  There will be a next time.

I tackled the studio thread mess!

When you have been long arm quilting since 1995 you can amass a whole lot of cone thread.  In ALL the colors.

Over time these thread drawers became quite messy – and let’s face it.  It never even made it ON to my To-Do list as things I needed to take care of.  There are always better irons in the fire – right?

It's been more than a year since we moved the studio to the QPO - in that move, the thread mess became worse.

Well, Saturday was the day.  I organized by color families.  I culled cones that no longer had sufficient thread to complete a machine quilting job – those “not enough thread” cones will be wound as bobbins for things like scrappy string piecing when the color or weight of my thread matters little.  

The most important thing is to use up what I can.

Have you ever stopped to think at the fortune you have invested in your thread?  And it may be pretty to look at, but it is better invested in the quilt!

Still – I think it will be a long long long time before I ever need to buy thread again. Just saying!

This job also started yesterday.

It was time to unearth the fat quarter boxes from the garage/shop and start filling these shelves.  I vowed to go through the boxes and condense things along the way -

I’ve gotten this far.

I swear this is more somewhere!

And now that the Fat Quarter boxes are here -

It’s time to empty THIS cabinet!

I’ve been working from this small stash cabinet for several years now, adding to it when I need more, hoping to sew most of it up -

Now I will be folding this fabric and merging it with the fat quarter stash already in boxes.

When that cabinet is empty -

It will be filled with my books from the Wallburg house.

The folding could take a while -

Anything less than 1/2 a fat quarter will be cut down into strips and shuffled into the Scrap User’s System. Anything half a fat quarter to fat quarter size will be stored in these boxes.

We’ll tackle the yardage cabinets at some future date.  One daunting thing at a time!

The thing about organizing?  It's like making a bed.  You have to keep working with it - because what's done is undone every time you pull something out to cut, sew, press. It never stays done, but it can always be better.

How are things going on your own organizational journey wherever you are?

There is still time to get your entry in on our Quilter’s Project Planner Gift-Away!

There are just a few days left to participate.  Click to THAT POST and enter!  And while you are there, check out the other sites listed and visit them for more places to enter to win! 

I will be drawing for our winner here on the 18th.

And if you are as excited about the Quilter’s Project Planner as I am (Along with Love Your Creative Space which is encouraging me all along my organizing journey!) you can find both titles in the New and Books categories of the Quiltville Store.

Quilter’s Project Planner is expected to arrive this week, and I will start shipping them out as soon as they land on my door step.

Quiltville Quote of the Day -

What else can I say - it's 2020!

Watch out for those clowns!

Have a great Monday, everyone!