The Botched Bag

Remember when I totally botched up my tote bag measurements?  I ended up with two pieces of material that were too short to make the tote bags.  Luckily, I had enough material for 3 bags (including some green material for contrasting handles).   So I completed the two for the Scout House auction and set the rest of the material aside for a later day.

That day finally came.  The two miscut pieces were shortened a bit more and became the two sides.  I had another piece that became the bottom and extends up the sides by a couple of inches (if you look closely you can see the double-stitched seam).

I love the green handles.  I wish I had bought more green; I would have done the bottom panel with the green as well.  I think would have looked really cool (and less likely to get dirty).  Maybe I'll do that for a future bag.

I'm also really happy with the bottom-to-side seams.  I doubled them over on the inside (the part in the oval), so there's no raw edges.  I discovered when sewing the first two bags that denim frays just by looking at it!  Therefore, I've tried to leave as few raw edges as possible.  I knew those horizontal seams would get a lot of contact, so finishing them off was a must.  I figured the extra row of stitching would help the strength of the bag, too.

Looks pretty good for something that originally went horribly wrong.  Now I just need to figure out who to gift it to....