How To Make A Quilted Tote Bag

Start with a piece of patchwork. Mine is 29 inches by 14 inches Pin the patchwork to the batting.







Quilt the top and batting together. I used a freemotion quilting design of hearts.







Lay the quilt onto the backing and pin. Stitch around the outside to join the layers together.






I neeed to make the pattern for the base. Measure the length of the bag (29 inches) and minus 1/2 inch. This is the perimeter (28.5 inches) I need for the base of my bag. I use a tape measure to help me draw the pattern.








Make a sandwich of your lining batting and bottom layer. Quilt them together.








Cut out the base using your pattern.








Sew the side seams of the bag together. I have added a strip of fabric to bind the seam.









Fold the binding strip over the seam and tuck the raw edge under. Sew just the strip down just inside the side seam.








Pin the base and bag body together. Mark the base and sides into quarters with pins.








Match the pins on the base and bag together and pin together.








This is a little tricky. Tack the base and body together. Being careful not to pucker the bag body.









This is what it looks like. I need to sew a binding on to hide the seam.









Cut the binding for the bottom and top of the bag. I used a 2 1/4 inch strip and added 2 inches to length of the base perimeter for overlap.









Fold the binding in half. Sew it onto the base of the bag from the top side. Being careful to sew just outside the seam so you cover the basting stitches.









The bottom binding is on ready to be handsewn down on the underside. Sew a Binding to the top edge of the bag in a similar way.









Prepare the handles. I like to cut my batting 1 1/2 inches wide by the length I want. I cut the fabric 4 inches by the length. I iron the one long edge over the batting.








The other edge I iron 1/4 over then fold it over the batting and iron again.







I sew down the centre of the strap with a decorative stitch to close the seam.







Sew the straps onto the bag with a close zig zag seam. I then fold the handles to the top and top stitch with a straight stitch.







Here is the bag ready to have the bindings handstitched down.








Hand stitch the bindings down.









Here is the bag finished. I embellished it with some buttons at the base of the straps.