Folded Fabric Star: Tote Bag Edition

Though my soul may set in darkness,
It will rise in perfect light,
I have loved the stars too fondly
To be fearful of the night.

–Sarah Williams

Once upon a time, I saw a really cool folded fabric star. And so, of course, I had to make my own.

I went to the tutorial, decided I was definitely not going to make a pot holder, got my fabrics ready and made a tote bag. Geta deserves the credit for the tote bag idea. I made the straps nice and long so that I could comfortably put it over my shoulder and not have the bag hitting me just under the armpit.

I had most of this bag finished before I dropped Grace off for her three-week spa vacation on April 10^th. As a matter of fact, on the day I took her in I only needed to put on the binding around the top of the bag, but didn't dare take the time to do it for fear of missing the repair man's pick-up time {which is not an exact time; just whenever he gets to the shop on that particular Wednesday} and have to wait another week. By the time I got Grace back on May 3^rd, I'd moved on to other things and this bag sat for another couple of weeks. Sometime very early this week, or maybe even late last week, I lost my mojo. I got kind of worried there for a bit, when my funk lasted for more than a day or two and my desire to sew completely vanished. I picked this back up with the hope that doing something easy that would lead to a quick finish would put me back in my groove. It didn't really. I finished this several days ago and wasn't super excited about it. Eventually my mojo came back all on its own, though, and I am really happy with how it turned out.

The red center of the star isn't quite large enough. While I actually did read through the directions, when it came time to place the fabrics, I just looked at the pictures and missed the part about moving the second fabric ½” down from the first and leaving ¼” between fabrics after that. But there was no way I was unpicking. Next time I'll remember. And there probably will be a next time because I need a cool tote bag for church. I added an extra color, using nine fabrics instead of just eight. To compensate, I increased the base fabric and the width of the fabric rectangles by ½”. I'm pretty happy with how it turned out. I kept the quilting simple. Actually, I just copied the quilting in the tutorial, not wanting to distract from the star of the show, the folded fabric star. And I didn't think the bag itself needed anything fancy, either. I just did straight lines on the front and diamonds, or intersecting lines at a 45˚ angle on the sides and back.

I'm using this as my “go bag” for hand sewing projects. I almost always take a little something to work on when I know I'm going to be sitting and waiting, like at the doctor's office or the driver license division or a book signing. I've been using ziplock bags, which keep the project clean, but they're a little tricky to juggle when the waiting stops and the business to attend to commences. I'll keep my Stitchy Kit inside it all the time, and I'll probably still use ziplock bags to hold my projects, but I'll slip those inside the tote bag when it is time to go. Functional and fabulous, no?

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Show Off Friday at Pieceful Life