Tutorial: Repurposed Pottery Barn Bags

A year ago I bought a new sewing machine which was quite an upgrade from the machine I was using.  I have a Bernina Activa 230 and I purchased a Bernina 750 QE.  I liked the machine but within 6 months I found I was using the embroidery on the machine more than I thought I would and there were some limitations on the embroidery program in the 750 machine and I Decided to upgrade to a Bernina 830. I have been having so much fun embroidering with my new toy!  The grandkids are the recipient of most of my projects.

One day I was at DownEast and came across these cute backpacks.  If you are familiar with DownEast they have many children's items that are monogrammed with names.  These items were originally sold through Pottery Barn for 30$-40$.  DownEast buys the blemished or misspelled items to then sell in their store at a reduced cost.  I was able to purchase a slew of bags and backpacks for 30% off the reduced cost!  When DownEast receives products into their stores they price and date the product.  The longer the item is in the store the lower the price will be.  The prices will drop each month and then periodically the store has a really good sale like a 30% off the lowest marked price on the product. These were all less than 10$ a piece.  

One of the first projects I made with my new machine was done using these bags I had found. I made patches for each of the grandkids with their name on it and then put them on a back pack. Instead of picking out the names and then embroidering a new name on the bag I created patches large enough to place over the blemish or old name.  It was a big hit with the grand-kids as they started the new school year. 

A friend of my daughter Micquel noticed the cute patch and wanted to know where she got them.  This mom had also bought a backpack from DownEast for her son but she picked out the name.  After picking out the name the old name could still be seen.  Micquel asked me if I would make a patch for her friends little boy which I did and his mom was so excited.  Kids love personalized things.

My older grand-daughters played baseball this past summer.  From DownEast I was able to find these long duffel bags that could hold a bat, and all their baseball gear.  The bags were pink and white polka dot.  The patches were the perfect touch to personalize their bags.  They were so cute and they even used them to pack for our Disney land trip this past summer. 

For my oldest grandson's backpack I created a patch with a dinosaur and his name on it.  The grandkids use these cute bags and backpacks to take on car trips or airplane trips.  The kids get to carry them and it has all the special things in them they want to take to entertain themselves on their trips. So much fun!

These are some of the items I have purchased and what I paid for them:

Backpacks-depends on size                                $7.00 or less

Other Bags-depends on size                                $9.00-$15.00

Large Beach towels                                             $5.00 or less

Notebooks                                                          $2.50 or less

Computer bags                                                    $2.50 or less

Hooded baby towels                                            $3.00-$5.00

I love a good bargain!  I can’t possibly go to even Walmart and buy items like these for these prices.  The hooded baby towels are a great baby gift and I would not even be able to buy terry cloth fabric for the price of these towels.  At JoAnn's the cost of terry cloth is anywhere from $9.99- 12.99 a yard.  With a 40% off coupon the cost would be $5.99-$9.09 a yard.  Then it would take a pack of binding at $1.99 a pack and it may take as much as 2 packs to finish the edge.  This brings the cost of making a hooded baby towel $8.00-$10.00.

For the machine embroidery I will buy multiple towels.  Most of the towels come in blue gingham border for boys and pink gingham border for girls.  I purchased 5 towels of each.  One towel of each color will be used to create the new hoods for the other 4 towels.  I use the hood I cut off as a template to cut out new hoods.   

So, the first thing I do is to cut the hood part of the baby towel off.  I do this by cutting very close to the bound edge of the hood. 

Take the extra towel and place the cut off hood against the outside edge of the remaining large part of the towel. This gives the new hoods a bound edge to match the towel and I can cut 4-5 new hoods from one towel.  I like to cut them a little larger leaving about ½” extra.  I then embroider the design I have chosen onto the newly cut out hood.  When I am done embroidering I will recut the hood the size I need.  I don’t want to pick any part of the binding off so instead I take the newly embroidered hood and place it in the corner of the towel and I will pin then stitch a tight zig zag stitch to attach the hood.  Stitch this as close to the binding edge as possible.  The terry cloth helps to hide this stitch so that it does not need to be sewn into the bound edge. 

 If you don’t have an embroidery machine it is still possible to applique a design on using fabric and a shape of your choice.  This could be a baby duck, a flower, frog, fish, car, or even letters to spell out the baby's name.  

When I machine applique I use a product called Heat N Bond lite.  This product is sold at Walmart and fabric stores.  I like to buy a large roll, 17” X 5.25  yards, because I do a lot of applique and it is more economical than the small packages. 

Pick out the fabric you would like to use and then iron on the heat-n-bond.  Trace the design on the back of the paper on the fabric and cut out the design.  When the design is cut out then peel the paper off and iron on the design on the fabric centering on the hood.  When I machine applique I use a blanket stitch but a zig-zag stitch works just as well.

When I get my beach towels embroidered I will share the results.