Repurpose Long Sleeve Into A Bag (Part 2)

After the stencil work, I want to add piping to the bag but I don't have any piping cord.:( What to do? Go to the nearest notion shop & buy one or reuse some piping cord from old pillows? 

Lucky me! I found an old pillow with piping cord with the exact needed length to sew on the bag. 

But before you get to the happy ever after part, you have to go through this battle of tearing the pieces apart to get the precious piping cord. Once the piping cord is in you hand, you can *smile* & say out loud "I've made it!" :P ( Sorry for making this sound so hard, actually it's not! Maybe I need a cuppa coffee.)

For the piping strips, I'm using muslin. The strips is 4cm wide with enough lengths to sew along the border line. You can learn how to sew & attach your piping here at sew4home.

Here's the sewn piping on both parts of the fabric. It's not that hard to sew but sewing corners makes me nervous still.

Then I sew the handles. I used a blue stripe nylon webbing with 50cm in length on both sides of the fabric pieces.( I would usually add an extra 1" for seam allowance on both ends of strap.)

Pockets are sewn on both sides of the lining. I used bed sheet & some pieces of the long sleeve to make the pockets. 1 big pocket & 2 small pockets that can fit hand phone, wallet & note book.

Here comes the not so easy part of attaching the whole pieces together. There are many ways to sew this kind of boxy bag. Some would sew the outer & lining fabrics separately & attach them together by sewing on the zipper. Others would just serge the fabric corners minus any lining. But I just sew it my way. Every time I'm in doubt  & not sure which part to sew first, I would always write it down on my note book. So here's the note....you don't have to take a note, just do it you way :)

The zipper, gusset & lining pieces are sewn the same way as sewing a pencil case. Top gusset is 17" in length & bottom gusset is 26" in length. I sew cotton  webbing on both ends of the zipper.

Here's the lining side of the gusset. See...only the front gusset, zipper & lining gusset are sewn together. The bottom lining gusset is sewn together with top lining gusset. The top front gusset & bottom front gusset are sewn together. Both front & lining are only connected on the zipper part. Now the gusset is done.

Next, I attached the front piece of the bag to the front gusset. Sew a running stitch to hold the pieces together.

Then I sew the parts on sewing machine being extra careful along the corners. The bag is taking shape now. Before I attach the second front piece, I open the zipper a bit  so I can easily turn it right side out later. After sewing the second piece together clip the corners. I didn't do that on this bag but it's necessary to help ease around the corners.

The lining piece is sewn to the gusset lining.

When you turn it right side out, the first sewn lining piece looks like this.

This is the second last step. The second lining piece is sewn together with gusset lining & I left 3" opening for turning.

See the opening....

Turn it right side out through the opening.

Finally, sew shut the opening with a slip stitch. Hurray! I'm done.

This is the inside lining & pockets. But where's the finished look of the bag?

Coming soon in part 3......:)