Shopping Tote from Scraps

I recently participated in Rhonda's Shopping Tote swap, the aim of which was to make a shopping tote from recycled materials if possible. I had seen a couple of great tote patterns on the internet so I was pretty keen to have a go, even though my sewing skills are pretty much limited to machine sewing straight lines!

To help me along the way, my generous Mum sent me home from our Easter holiday with two baskets full of fabric scraps from her quilting, and a section of fabric left over from backing another of her quilts. I had originally planned to use the scraps to do some applique on this tote pattern, but after a quick sort through the remnants, I decided to attempt to do some crazy patchwork from some of the little bits, and just make it up as I went along!

So I spent a morning randomnly sewing together little pieces of fabric to form a large banner section, to form the top section of the tote.



The leftover backing fabric I was going to use for the bottom section didn't match the pieces I had chosen (it was the wrong shade of blue), so I decided to use it to make the lining for the inside of the tote. For the outside, I had a quick look through my linen cupboard, and voila! There was a couple of linen napkins that I never use, in exactly the right shade! So I sewed the two patchwork banner sections to each end of one of the napkins, and folded it in half (with the right sides together), then sewed the edges together, to form a bag.


To make the lining, I pinned the tote to Mum's backing fabric remnant and cut out two pieces the same size, sewed the two side seams together, and along half of the bottom edge - leaving a gap in the middle to be used to turn the tote the right way out after sewing the lining to the bag. I also cut out two pocket sized pieces, folded over all of the edges twice to form a hem and ironed them flat and sewed along the top edge Then I sewed the other three edges onto the right side of the lining.

The lining and the bag were placed right sides together and sewed together along the top, and then turned right side out through the gap in the lining. I sewed the bottom seam of the lining closed, then a bit of stitching around the top edge and along the fabric strips of the patchwork finished it off. I made a couple of handles from more leftover fabric strips Mum had in her stash (plus fabric the same as the interior bag lining), sewed them on, and added some lovely old wooden buttons just to add a little something extra to finish it off.

Ta da! A shopping tote made from fabric scraps, a linen napkin and some old buttons.

It's certainly not the most outstanding example of patchwork ever seen, LOL, but I found it extremely rewarding to be able to produce something useful from remnants and leftovers. I think that this is a skill that will certainly be useful in the future as resources become more scarce.