Amy Butler: Ginormous Edition

My mother in law asked me a while back to make a tote bag for her, and of course I put it off to the last minute, until this weekend, as I was scrambling  to get it done.  She is a teacher, and wanted a gift for her student teacher this semester.  She asked that the bag either be all white, or have a large white portion, as she wanted to have each of her students sign it before giving it  to her at the end of the semester.  Her other request was that it was pretty big so she could use it to carry her books and other teaching supplies to and from class.

Now, as soon as she said "big tote bag," I immediately thought of the Reversible Everyday Shopper from the Amy Butler Style Stitches book.  All I can think of with this bag is how Kati's small children actually fit inside! Now if that doesn't say "large tote bag" I don't know what does.  

I pulled out my Style Stitches book, and went to town cutting out the pattern pieces (only 2!) and cutting out my fabric.  I will say this is by far the easiest Amy Butler pattern I've worked on to date, and quick also.  I'd say from absolute start to finish it took about four hours to complete.  

I knew I wanted to use some print in this bag, as plain white is just too boring.  I found this green leaf home dec weight print at Joann's and thought it would be great.  I also just love that this bag is reversible.  For the purposes of this particular bag, I loved that the pocket was so large, and definitely will accommodate many  a children's autographs.

I veered off the cutting instructions slightly from the pattern, as I made the inside version of this bag the exact opposite of the outside.  That way if she doesn't want all the signatures on display all the time, she can simply flip it inside out and have a fully functional bag!

I also made just a small alteration to the size.  I toyed around with scaling the pattern pieces down on my home printer/copier, but the more I played with it, the more I realized that my main issue with this bag and its size was the height, and not the width.  I decided to trim the top of the main body and side parts of the bag down 1 inch, and I think that really helped.  If I had it to do over again, I would probably cut an inch of the top of the pocket pieces, and two inches off the top, but I'm still pleased with the end result here.  

I could see myself making this bag again, as I keep saying I want to make a few fun reusable shopping bags.  I would definitely make the the above mentioned size adjustments, and I think it would be just right.

I'll be linking up to Sew Modern Monday over at Canoe Ridge Creations, stop by and see all the modern finishes!