The Totes Ma Tote sewing pattern has a fresh new look, with gorgeous new fabric and photos. It's still the same bag pattern, with trendy straps, a zipper opening, and awesome inside pockets.

The Totes Ma Tote pattern is an intermediate pattern, and includes instructions with measurements in both imperial and metric. All of the pattern pieces are rectangular in shape, so cutting instructions are provided to cut all of your pieces with your rotary cutter, ruler, & mat.

The pattern is available in 2 forms:

• PDF Download 
• & Printed Paper

Aimee from The Little Bird Designs made up this gorgeous sample for my cover, using this Japanese Chrysanthemum fabric by Philip Jacobs, designed for the Kaffe Fassett Collective. Such a beautiful large print, it's like it was made for this tote bag. All fabric were purchased from The Quilter's Bolt. Thank you, Aimee!

The top opening of the bag features an easy to install zipper opening. If zippers are not your thing, you could leave the entire zipper gusset out.


There are 6 purse feet to install in the bag bottom.


Let's take a closer look at those inside pockets!  These are very easy to sew, and once you learn how to use these components, you can add them to other bags too. There is a very large pocket on one side, with a snap closure. Great for an electronic device or pesky bills.


The other side has a zipper pocket to keep items safe and secure and a double slip pocket for your mobile phone, keys, sunglasses or wallet.

Finished Size:

Width at Top: 17” (43 cm)
Width at bottom: 13” (33 cm)
Height: 12” (30 cm)
Depth: 4” (10 cm)

We had a FANTASTIC January to June 2016 Bag of the Month Club season, and now that it's wrapped up, we can announce the winners of the prizes we rounded up from our super sponsors.

Let's make some gorgeous & professional looking hanging tassels to match all of your handmade bags and purses! They are quick and easy, and a very trendy fresh look for your next project, or even some older bags that need a little charm. Can't get enough of these!

So let's get our stuff and get started! 

We've got the hardware, tassel cap hooks, in either a nickel or gold finish, and you've got the perfect leather or vinyl and the necessary supplies. Well… maybe you need an excuse to go shopping. Ahem, you need to go buy supplies.

Supplies:

• 1 piece of leather or vinyl 3 1/2" wide (wider for very thin leather) x 3" high (or longer for a longer tassel)
• 1 strip of leather or vinyl 3/8" wide x 2 1/8" long for the trim on the cap
• 1 mini screw driver
• 1 AWL to puncture fabric (found in any sewing store)
• glue: Rubber Cement or Contact Cement (Elmer's Rubber cement, Barge's Contact or Rubber, or your hardware store Contact Cement)
• hardware: 1 tassel cap with screw from Emmalinebags.com
• scissors to cut leather or vinyl 

Cut the fringe by cutting slits about 1/8" apart, leaving 1/2" across the top uncut.  That's kind of important or you will just have about 22 little strips of leather. I just did them freehand, but if you feel better drawing them, go ahead. Those little strips break off easily, so be careful!


I put some glue inside the cap too, and pushed the tassel straight into place.


Now you could leave it just as it is if you don't want the trim on the cap, but if you do, follow the next step.

Try the leather strip for fit. It should overlap the end by about 1/4". Leather doesn't stick well to metal, but you can have more success sticking leather to leather, so that is why you need the overlap. Follow the directions on the contact cement or rubber cement packaging, and glue the overlapping bit down. When they say let it dry before you stick, they really mean it.


I hope you like your hanging tassels as much as I do, but maybe not as much as my husband does. It took him about 1 minute to figure out that it's quite fun to clip 2 to the front of his T-shirt and try to make them swing around in circles, if you know what I mean. And yes, I got it on video!

Thanks for reading!

Janelle

Introducing The Gabby Bag: A shoulder bag that goes together in a fast and unique way, and will be a very fun sew. You can add both exterior and interior zipper pockets, as well as a double slip pocket in the lining. She's had a ton of great reviews with the Bag of the Month Club. Gabby was the April 2016 pattern, but now that the subscription time is over, it is available to everyone.
Find it in our sewing patterns section. 

Now for a few more pictures of my latest Gabby.
If you would like to see the testers photos, go to this post.

The back side of the Gabby, with exterior zipper pocket.

The lining with an interior zipper pocket and double slip pocket.

The Gabby Bag pattern PDF version was publicly released on our website July 1st, but the poor girl didn't get much of an intro because I was on holidays at the time.

We were making our way to BC from Alberta and I actually made it go live on the website whilst sitting in our travel trailer, that was in the bottom of a large vehicle ferry, that was traveling across the Georgia Straight to Vancouver Island. Janelle's in the trailer, in the belly of the boat, on the sea… I felt a bit like Pinocchio, but my nose is just naturally pointy, I told no lies or had any special surgery to get it as long and pointy as it is!