I made this tote bag last week as a birthday present for my friend Danielle, who’s very much a cat person (check out her blog, it’s seriously amazing!). It was a bit belated because I totally underestimated how much time I would need for it and started it the day I was planning to give it to her. Then I got caught up sewing my skirt for the Sewing Match, and that delayed it further (her birthday was the 4th and I finally gave it to her on the 14th!) but despite the lateness I’m really excited about how it turned out and I think Danielle liked it too!

First, I asked Phillip to help me draw out a cute cat, and he whipped this up on Illustrator in about ten minutes! I printed it out a few times so I could cut out each section and trace it on the fabric. I used Wonder-Under to adhere each piece to the fabric and then stitched the edges for extra definition. I used a needle to pull the thread ends to the back and tied them off.

I think it’s a pretty good resemblance? How about you?

A close up of the stitching. I was going for a slightly imperfect (but not overly messy) look. Hopefully I pulled it off!

I made the bag itself with some cream-colored denim twill and lined it with some black-and-white striped fabric that began its life as a sheet. I think the lining gives it a little extra pizazz.

This project was a great stash-buster and scrap-user! I had all of the fabric laying around in my house already and the pieces for the cat only required little scraps of fabric. I’m so smitten with how this turned out that was thinking of making some similar bags to sell on Etsy. What do you think? Should I try it? Which designs would you like to see?