Are you guilty of overthinking things? I am for sure. Sometimes I get ideas in my head and I can’t let them go. That is what happened while trying to create this DIY Pamela Munson inspired bag. I’m not one to toot my own horn, but I’m fairly crafty. I like the process of trying to figure out how things are made. I get it from my mom. When she was little, my grandmother gave her a Micky Mouse watch as a gift. She was so curious to see how it worked that she took it apart. Needless to say; that was the end of Mickey.
Anyway, I have had Pamela Munson’s bags in my head all summer. They are beautiful. I have been thinking about how to DIY one for weeks. When I saw these straw place mats on Amazon the wheels in my head started to turn. I thought, okay now I have a starting point. I decided I wanted to somehow attach a piece of fabric between the two place mats but couldn’t figure out how to secure it.
I don’t have an industrial sewing machine so sewing it was not an option. I was stumped so I enlisted my mom for advice. She and my dad came to visit and we sat on the front porch with a bottle of wine and brainstormed ideas. We came up with plenty, and I’m sure the wine had something to do with it. However, all our ideas seemed very complicated. We thought about using grommets or rivets, but I didn’t want anything to show on the outside of the place mat. We even tried to staple it from the inside, but they wouldn’t hold, and I was afraid of damaging the place mat.
Ultimately, we decided to hand sew it using invisible thread. It took forever! She held the bag while I stitched. All I had was a small hand needle and I had to pull it through the wicker with pliers. Talk about tedious! After we finished it, it looked pretty good. The only problem was that you could still see the thread even thought it was clear. I thought I was okay with that, but the more I looked at it, it started to bother me.
I couldn’t let it go. A few days after my parents left, I pulled out the stitching and started over. I thought. let’s keep this simple. I’m going to glue it. Now, I’m not a big fan of gluing fabric. It never seems to look as nice as if it were sewn on a sewing machine, but I was out of options. I was going to make this bag no matter what.
Guess what? It looks great! I can’t believe how good it turned out. I liked it so much that I went back to Amazon and found a smaller set of place mats and made another one!
I wanted to make a green one also, but summer is almost over, (#sadface) and I wasn’t sure I would even have a chance to use all three. So, if any of you decided to make one please let me know in the comments at the bottom of the post. I would love to see it!
DIY Pamela Munson Inspire Bag
Materials:
Wicker place mats – you can find them small here and large-here
A piece of fabric 20″x 4″ for the small bag
A piece a fabric 24″ x 5″ for the large bag
Coordinating grosgrain ribbon 1.5″ wide
Craft glue – I recommend E6000
Pliers
Instructions
Finish the edges of your fabric. You can do this with a serger a zigzag stitch on your sewing machine.
Fold long sides over 1/4″ fold 1/4″ again and stitch each side.
Fold the short edges over 1/4″ one time and stitch. I realized that the corners became too bulky and wouldn’t lay flat if you try and turn it over a second time. You can see the serging a little bit on the inside. Mine stands out more because I didn’t have red thread for my serger. You could use fray check on the short ends and then you wouldn’t have to finish them at all.
Pin the fabric panel about an inch down from where you want it to begin to hold it in place.
Start gluing where the top of the fabric meets the place mat. I recommend gluing the place mat not the fabric. Pin in place as you glue.
Move your way around the outside of the place mat until you reach the other end.
Repeat these steps for the other side. When you are done, it should look like this:
Let dry overnight.
Decide where you want the ribbon to show on the outside of the bag and how long you want it to be. Feed it through the wicker from the inside. Mine is pretty much centered in the middle but yours doesn’t have to be. I used a pair of pliers to feed it through the wicker. You might need to poke a small hole fit it through, but it’s okay. The ribbon will hide it.
Tie a lose knot and let it hang down on the outside of the bag. I also recommend melting the end of the ribbon with a lighter so it won’t fray.
Repeat these steps on the other side.
Next, glue the ribbon along the inside of the bag. Otherwise, it gets in the way and doesn’t hang right on your arm.
All done!
If you would rather buy than DIY, no problem. You can shop the look below. Don’t forget to check some of my other DIY bag tutorials here, here, and here.
Thanks for reading! Happy Monday.