drawstring bags from shirt sleeves

Remember those button-up shirt pillows from earlier this week (see below post)? Well I needed to do something with the sleeves and the rest of the shirts and I’ve been wanting to make some drawstring bags for traveling (keeping all those baby socks together, keeping shoes from touching my other packed items, having a lightweight bag from which to pull toys from when on the plane,etc). Well, I put those scraps to good use last night.

I kind of made up the pattern for each one a little differently and even put the drawstrings in differently in each one…learning as I went. I recall seeing Martha’s drawstring bags in her magazine last month (but could not find on them her website) and her directions are probably good (she is THE Martha, after all—maker of all “good things”) but I did not follow them. Who has time to follow directions when trial and error is so much more fun?

Here is what I ended up with.

Here they are re-arranged after baby walked over them.

We even used one today to pack our son’s lunch in when we went to the zoo! You can see that the sewing is a mite pitiful, but who cares? They are functional!

I will probably be making a bunch more of these. I have an awesome idea for one that I will save for later, so stay tuned! Not sure when it will come to fruition since I want it for a room that I have yet to decorate, but have some BIG ideas for!!! I am so excited, but I think it will have to wait a while since I will need some large chunks of time which, so far, I have yet to find! Oh how I wish that dang job was not in the way, but I could still make money!