Just because... It's Summer!!!
Who doesn't need a summer backpack?!
"The products featured in this post were given to me by Island Batik"
featuring: Island Batik Wonderland collection designed by Kathy Engle
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It's summer and most of us are still in a "stay at home status", so this post is about keeping dreaming about the moment that you will be able to pack your backpack and get away ;) So, let's get prepared for this in style!
It's been some years since I had the Flying Geese Patchwork Bag (click to be directed to the link) from Giuseppe Ribaudo for the We All Sew in my wish list projects, and this month I finally had some time to try it! You can access all the fabric requirements by visiting the link above.
Once again this is not my pattern, but this time I added some details to the project, so I will describe them here!
First let's talk about the fabric, because is a 2 1/2" strip friendly pattern I chose to use an Island Batik 2 1/2" by 44" strips package with 2 sets of 20 individual fabric strips from the Wonderland Collection, designed by Kathy Engle. You will actually need just the half of the package, so maybe you can even make... 2 backpacks!!!
I did follow the tutorial up to adding the last strip to the flying geese outside of the backpack and BEFORE sewing in a tube.
I decided to add some quilting to the backpack, so I did cut the same size of Hobbs Heirloom Premium 80/20 Cotton/Polyester blend batting and NO fabric on the back. Just layer the two pieces together like a regular quilt but with no fabric on the back, pin and quilt as desired. I decided echo 1/4" the piecing lines instead of stitch in the ditch the roll thing, I liked it because it added a special detail and also highlighted the geese. I was using Aurifil 50wt, color 2510 and the walking foot of my Bernina 790.
I also did the same with the outside circle of the bottom, like quilt with batting and no fabric on the back.
In my case, I was thinking about to using the backpack for summer, so I decided to add a mesh pocket bag inside to store a phone, a book, car key and all the important things that you don't want to be bouncing around inside the backpack. I had some lightweight mesh fabric by Annie's in navy 18" x 54", and I used a rectangle of 20"x18" and 2 pieces of 2" x 11" of fabric to create a tube for a "drawstring bag".
It was a really cool project and everybody here loves the new backpack that is already at this moment at the pool side, while I'm here, writing for you ;) Here the final images, and I hope you are having a good start of summer!
