DIY Drawstring Backpack | Make Thrift Buy #22

Hello, and welcome back to another episode
of Make Thrift Buy, the show where I...

have a cold.
BUT also, you send me pictures of clothes

that you've found on the internet, and I try
my best to recreate them!

Today's challenge was suggested by the lovely
ada_oline, who wanted me to try out this silvery

drawstring bag. I found this bag on a couple
of different sites, including some Etsy stores,

Ebay... I basically found this bag everywhere.

Drawstring bags are pretty simple.

So, we'll get started!

The special materials I needed for this project
were some silver fabric, an eyelet or grommet

kit with tools, and approximately 74 inches
of rope.

I started out by cutting out my bag material.
To do this, I folded my silver material in

half, right-sides together, and on the wrong-side
of the fabric, I drew a rectangle that was

13 by 17 inches.

I then put some pins through
both pieces of fabric to hold them together,

then cut out the rectangle, making sure to
cut through both pieces of fabric. By folding

my material in half before cutting, I’ve
saved time by cutting out both pieces at once.

Then, I leave the pins in the material, and
I sew around the edges of the bag like this.

I make sure to leave 2 inches not sewn up
the top here, and I also don’t sew the top edge.

I’m using an overlocker to sew - because
it’s fast and I’m lazy - but you can definitely

also just use a normal straight stitch on
a sewing machine, or even hand-sew this with

a needle and thread.

When you’re done, your two rectangles should
be sewed together, right-sides together, like

this. And I know you can’t see my stitches
here because I was using light-coloured thread,

but they *are* there, and they look like this.

Next, I folded down this top, unsewn edge,
by ONE inch, like this.

And then I pinned this edge down all the way
around the top of the bag, so that I had this.

And then I sewed all the way around the bag,
to create a kind of tube on both the front

and back sides of the bag, like this.

When you get to the side seam of your bag,
you should stop sewing, lift up your needle

and cut the threads, and start again on the
other side of the seam, so that you get two

tubes, one of the front and one on the back
of the bag.

When I was done sewing, I turned my bag the
right way around! And, I also pushed out the

corners of the bag using a ruler.

Then, on the two bottom corners, I sewed over
the top of each corner like this. Just make

sure that this corner is big enough for your
eyelet to fit inside.

Okay, so now it’s time to set the eyelets!
Now, this is the eyelet kit that I bought.

DO NOT get this brand of eyelets – which
is called Sullivan’s – this kit was totally

wrong and incomplete just and didn’t….
work. And also led me to ruin most of my eyelets

while I was practicing, and, as you can see,
my table!

Anyway, I got it to work because I found an
anvil and a tool that I could use in another

button kit that I owned – Thanks, NEWEY
– so I inserted my eyelets by making a little

hole in the middle of that corner triangle,
making the hole bigger using a pen, inserting

this larger eyelet piece through the hole,
placing the anvil underneath, then placing

the washer over the top, putting this tool
thingy in the middle, and then bashing the

whole thing down with a hammer. Which gave
me this pretty eyelet in my fabric. Hooray!

I repeated this on both the bottom corners
of the bag.

Now it’s time to add the bag straps. So,
I cut myself about 74 inches of rope.

Then, I threaded the rope as follows:

First, through one of the eyelets, and I tied
a knot in the short end.

Then, I inserted a safety pin into the other
end of the rope to help guide it, and I threaded

the rope through the top tube.

...and then I
pulled it through until the strap on the left

was about the right length for a bag.

Then I threaded the rope through the BACK
tube, and out the other end.

And I pulled the excess rope all the way through.

Then I threaded the rope, once again, through
this TOP tube. So, there are two layers of

rope going through the top tube now. Because
of this, it can be a bit hard to get the rope

in there, but keep persevering and you’ll
get it there eventually.

I pulled this rope all the way through, and
then threaded it though the last eyelet...

...and I tied a knot in the end, and snipped off
the excess rope.

Then, I tried the bag on, found the rope to
be a little bit too long, so I cut it shorter

at the ends and re-tied the knots until both
the straps were about the right length.

And that’s it.

So, how did I go?

[music plays]

So - I am *really* please with how this one
turned out! And my conclusion is a definite

[scissors snipping sound effect]

Yeah - you can really easily make this for
yourself, even if you're a beginning sewer

- in fact, if you're new to sewing, I think
that this is a really good project to be one

of your first projects, because you don't
have to sew too much, you're only ever sewing

straight lines - in fact, considering how
easy this is to make, it's kind of outrageous

the amount that I found for it online.
But, if you make this for yourself, and even

if you buy all the materials new, you're not
going to be spending more than $10 or $15

on this.
So that's it from me for today! I hope you're

all having a really good day, and I'll see
you all for my next video.