Fabric gift bags and how to make them

First up, lay out your piece of fabric with the right sides together.

Lay your paper pattern piece on the fabric, with one long edge of the paper pattern lined up along the fabric fold. Pin it in place and cut round it.

See the fold in the fabric above?

Once you've cut, it should look like this.



Now unpin your paper pattern and open up your fabric, laying it right side down on your table.



Next you need to hem the top edge, so fold it over once, like this...



then fold it over again like this, so the cut edge is tucked right under.



Pin....



and sew.



It should now look like this.



Next, fold your fabric in half with the right sides together and pin the edges. DO NOT pin your hemmed edge, this will be the open top of your bag.



Sew down the pinned sides.



Now, you're going to zigzag down the top few inches/cms of the sewn edge that is close to the hemmed edge, as shown.
This is an edge that will be visible once your bag is in use, so zigzagging it means the edge will not fray and will therefore look neater.


See the arrows? That is the part of the edge you need to zigzag.

Clip the pointy corner bits off the two bottom corners, this makes a neater corner once your bag is turned the right way out. If you're not fussy, miss this step.



Turn your bag the right way out.



Cut a length of matching ribbon and pin it to a side seam, like this. Find the middle of your length of ribbon and pin it at that point.
Place your ribbon a few inches/cms down from the top, so when you tie up your gift bag you have a pretty edge showing above the tie.



Sew it in place and your cloth gift is finished.

I loooove the cloth gift bags I've made.

They are a money saver, they are reusable, and they look lovely.

I no longer go through rolls of sticky tape or end up storing half used rolls of paper. Come Christmas eve, I grab a stack of bags and get wrapping. It's so much quicker and you don't need a flat surface to do it on. My recycle bin isn't overflowing with paper and ribbon the day after Christmas or a birthday, and then the bags get packed away, ready for the next gift giving event.

I've sewn my fabric gift bags using a sewing machine, but if you don't have one you could stitch by hand, though it would take a while longer. The way the ribbon is sewn into the side seam means you never lose it and you don't have to go rummaging around for something to tie up your bags with.

What sort of fabric, or cloth? Any sort will do, though I tend to stick to cotton/cotton mixes because I am no good at sewing stretch fabric.

Where do I get my fabric? I buy fabric off the roll but only if it's on sale, afterall, this is meant to be a money saving exercise. I have bought fabric out of the remnant bin at my local fabric store, I have re-purposed second hand table cloths and I have re-purposed clothing that is no longer being worn. That said, if I am using re-purposed fabric, my stipulation is it must not look worn. But that hot pink swirly cord skirt I bought 3 years ago and wore twice? Perfect condition, so a perfect candidate.

What about the ribbon? The ribbon I buy new, but I do wait until there is store-wide sale. And sometimes there are rolls of odd colours or patterns in the discount bin. I like to use satin ribbon usually, but I have used grosgrain, woven and other types of ribbon before and they all work just fine.