Simply Charming Twister Tote

It's Cool to Be Square Blog Hop. 

Thanks to Carol of Just Let Me Quilt, for hosting this blog hop.

Here is my Cool little story about Squares. I had wanted to make this tote bag for a while and this blog hop was the perfect reason to make it. I had purchased a charm pack in 2016 as we drove through Boise, Idaho on our way to Washington state for my Mom's 90th birthday celebration. We stopped at a few quilt shops along the way in a few states. I had no idea what I was going to use the charm pack for because I don't normally buy pre-cuts.

I figured I may as well use this charm pack for making the Simply Charming Tote (Around the Bobbin pattern). To make a Twister quilt or bag, you must first sew together squares (It's Cool to be Square). Well I forgot to take a photo of the squares all sewn together, but I did square up the scraps leftover after cutting the Twister blocks out and sewed those back together in the correct order, so here is essentially the same thing only in smaller squares:

This is a Moda Charm Pack with sewing related wording on the printed text fabrics and dots, stripes, plaid flower prints on the rest. In black, red, gray and white.

Here is my finished Simply Charming Tote:

If you know me then you know I like to make changes in bags I make by adding or subtracting things or both. Here I added strap tabs with rings and rivets to both the straps tabs and straps.

The back of the bag has different fabrics from the front. All from the same fabric charm pack.

I did add purse feet to the bag. (Not part of the pattern instructions).

Inside I added one slip pocket and a zippered pocket too. The bag closes with a magnetic snap and you can see the bag opens up nice and wide.

This fabric is printed with houses and trees and the text is all addresses.

I divided a pen pocket and the rest of the pocket is divided into smaller sections.

So boys and girls, the moral of this story is that Squares really are COOL, because they can grow up to become other cool things too like Twister quilts or bags, lol! That's my Cool to Be Square project. I hope you enjoyed it. Now be sure and check out the rest of today's blogs to see what project each of them came up with and if you missed any day, you can visit those other blogs that you missed too. Thanks for stopping by to visit.

May 22:

Just Let Me Quilt

Vroomans Quilts

Patchouli Moon Studio (you are here)

Den syende himmel

Quilt Fabrication

Samelia's Mum

In case you missed any of the other days, check them out:

May 18

Creatin' in the Sticks

Life in the Scrapatch

Day Brook Designs

Songbird Designs

The Darling Dogwood

Kathleen McMusing

Quilting Gail

May 19

MooseStashQuilting

Beaquilter

Quilt In A Not-Shell

Elizabeth Coughlin Designs

Seams To Be Sew

Daughters of Dorinda

Kathy's Kwilts and More

May 20

Ms P Designs USA

Selina Quilts

Karen's Korner

Just Because Quilts

Becky’s Adventures in Quilting and Travel

Sew Many Yarns

May 21

Scrapdash

Websterquilt

Quilt Schmilt

Vicki’s Crafts and Quilting

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Twister Tote

I made this Twister Tote last month. The pattern is from Around the Bobbin. It is a fun bag to make and I love the Twister look as it's fun and playful. This is a good size bag too. It measures 15" H x 15" W x 6" D.

Lisa's instructions are excellent. If you don't have the Twister ruler or don't want to make the Twister section on the bag, Lisa shows you how to make it with just fabric instead; like using a fun novelty fabric would look great. The pattern is available in pdf or paper form. Your local quilt shop may sell Around the Bobbin patterns too, so have a look next time you are there.

And as usual I made some changes to the bag. First, I chose to use batik and hand dyed fabric instead of solid fabrics. Then I added purse feet to the bag, riveted my handles to the outside of the bag and folded over the center of the handles to form a tube-like handle for easier grabbing. Inside the bag I added a zippered pocket and a shorter slip pocket on one side and the larger pocket on the other side. I added Kam snaps to keep the slip pockets closed, since they have a wider opening.

Back of bag.

Inside is a large slip pocket on one side and a zippered pocket with a shorter slip pocket across from it. Bag closes with a magnetic snap.

I added these 2 pockets, the zippered and slip pocket with a divided pen pocket.

On this slip pocket I added a pen pocket on the left, but the remaining pocket was too small to divide it again and a bit too large as is, so that's why I added a Kam snap to keep the pocket closed when not in use or when small items are inside. If something fits that is large and sticks out the top of the pocket, that's okay.

This pocket was part of the pattern and you were supposed to make 2 pf them, but I made one and the other pockets above instead. I didn't want to divide this pocket in half as then the 2 sides would be too narrow and not as useful, so I added the Kam snap here too to keep it closed.

I added a heavy interfacing to the bottom of the bag and then added purse feet to help keep the bottom clean. 

Lisa has another Twister bag called Simply Charming Twister Tote and I hope to make that one sometime in the next few months. It's really cute too. It is a little smaller than this one. These Twister totes are so much fun to make the Twister part and so useful to turn them into a bag. It satisfies both my patchwork-quilting and bag making creativity.
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