Lunch Bag

I've been trying to get in the habit of packing my lunch for work every day, but I just can't seem to break the out-to-lunch habit. So I decided to make a cute lunch bag to pack in! If nothing else I'll feel bad never using something I worked so hard to create, and I'll start packing lunch out of guilt. I think it'll work, right?

I used this tutorial by Martha Stewart as a guide, but changed some things to make my bag just how I wanted it. First I cut two pieces of each of my two fabrics, all four pieces being 9" x 13". I guess it's only necessary to cut two identical pieces of the same fabric, but I wanted a cute and different pattern on the inside of my bag. Not to mention the extra fabric gives it some stability.

I took a piece of each pattern and sewed wrong sides together, making two pieces like this by sewing all the way around. I was sure to use a teeny tiny seam allowance (like 1/8").

Once I made my two pieces I put right sides together and sewed around 3 sides (1/4" seam allowance), leaving one short side completely open. The right sides can be either one of the fabrics, but in this case I wanted the white fabric to be the outside of my bag, so I put those two sides together before I started sewing.

After sewing around the 3 sides, I turned the bag inside out and took it to the ironing board. By folding the top of the bag in about 1/4" and ironing, I created a nice crease to top stitch around and give the top of the bag a finished look.

At this point my bag looked like this:

I could've stopped here if I just wanted a simple sack to carry things in, but I wanted the bottom of my bag to be flat. To do this turned the bag inside out and folded the bottom to a point.

Then I opened the top flap up toward the top of the bag to create a diamond shape.

I measured 2" from each tip (top and bottom), drew a line from left to right, and then sewed across each line.

After I created the seam, I cut off the excess fabric on the other side of the stitched line (scrap will be a triangle). Now the bottom of my bag looks like a rectangle!

Almost done! Again, I could leave my bag like this, but I wanted to give it a little more structure. Back the ironing board I went! I folded the sides in on each side and ironed creases to create the paper bag shape.

Finally, I top stitched along each side to keep the creases and just like that, I had a lunch bag! One with cupcakes on it, at that :)

Now, if only I can manage to pack a lunch and show it off!