Hand-made grocery sacks extend life of T’s

Hand-made shopping bag with T-shirt logo and handwoven trim for straps

I had to retire a T-shirt from wear but wanted to preserve the logo because it had sentimental value for me. As it happened, I had a length of hand-woven trim that complimented the logo perfectly.

A flannel pillowcase formed the body of this tote and the tablet weaving formed the strap. I shortened the pillowcase by approximately half its original depth.

I cut the woven trim into two equal pieces and arranged the first piece so that it approximately divided the bag’s surface by thirds: pinning it up and back down again. 

I repeated this process with the remaining length of trim on the other side of the pillowcase; this gave me two handles for the bag.

I next turned the pillowcase inside out and sewed the bottom seam, catching both layers of fabric and the lengths of trim in my 1-inch seam allowance. Then, when the bag was right-side out again, I arranged the logo on the bag.

I made a second bag using a length of “Ram’s Horn” tablet-woven trim.

These hand-made bags are welcome additions to my household’s reusable grocery sacks plus I’ll have the pleasure at the check-out counter of saying I made the bags myself.

Another hand-made shopping bag, this with Ram's Horn tablet weaving