Baby Shower Gifts

My hubs coworkers threw us a co-ed baby shower a few weeks ago. It was amazing and so many of his co-Interns showed up despite barely knowing us and their busy schedules. I wanted to express my gratitude the best way I know how, handmade gifts of course! 

I made 6 boxy bags for the six ladies who coordinated the shower. I used a bunch of different fun prints and zippers and let them choose which one they wanted to take home. The boxy bag tutorial is a free one by Kelly at Kelbysews. It is very fast and easy. Even if you are afraid of zippers you should try this one out.

I used quilting cotton for the inside and outside fabrics. The outer panels were quilted using some scrap batting. I used a different quilting design on each bag to complement the fabrics. These were pretty soft still and didn't hold their box shape that stiffly. If you want a stiffer bag use heavier interfacing and a heavier home dec weight fabric for the outside of the bag.

1. Parisville outer fabric with FMQ clamshell quilting, Allison glass inner fabric and a purple zip
2. Jay McCaroll (center city? or the line before?) outer fabric with zigzag quilting and a dark gray zip
3. Alexander Henry Mercer print with FMQ loops, inner fabric from Hobby Lobby, hot pink zip
4. Hedgy outer fabric (forgot the designer, bought in Korea) with crisscrossed straight line quilting and a blue zip
5. Map outer fabric (also from Korea) with grid quilting, rock'n'romance inner fabric and a purple zip
6. Kona modern quilts print with wavy line quilting, blue zig-zig inner fabric, blue zip.

A word of caution. Make sure you follow the instructions on how to position the zipper when sewing it to the bag panels. I spent about an hour carefully pinning all my zipper sandwiches only to realize after I sewed the first one that they were all in backwards! Oh well, at least I only had to unpick one and simply flip the zipper and repin the rest.

Another fun tip that saves you time is to use some twill tape or ribbon for the side tabs instead of making them from fabric. I used up some twill tape from a recent Birch fabric order. I realized afterward that a quick glance at the bag and you may read bitch instead of birch. Ha, hopefully these girls have a sense of humor about it. I wouldn't mind having a bitchin' bag.

The ladies loved the bags. It was just a small way to say thank you. I hope they realize how much the shower meant to me. Because hubs and I just moved to St Louis, we don't have many friends in the area and our families are too far away to plan a shower. If his coworkers hadn't thrown us a shower we simply wouldn't of had one. 

This bag is perfect for handmade gifts for so many reasons. It is a versitile bag, perfect for makeup, colored pencils, nail polish kit, etc and can be made quickly. It is a great way to use some of the larger print fabric in your stash and all that scrap batting I know you have piled in a corner somewhere. I keep a bunch of zippers around in a multitude of colors so I can whip up a pouch or bag whenever I want. What is your go-to pattern for handmade gifts?