Pattern Background

Daypack in both children and adult sizes with grommets and drawstring opening, front pocket, hidden zip pocket under the front flap, and padded, adjustable straps.

Fabric and Notions

I used a polyester water repellent canvas, purchased almost exactly 10 years ago from Fabric Mart. I sewed the entire bag with matching Gutermann Mara 70 thread.

Zippers, ladder buckles, drawstring cord, cord stopper, front buckle, and 1” webbing were from Amazon.

Grommets are size 1 grommets from Wawak I had in my stash. You should technically use a size 0 for this pattern, but this is what I had in stock.

For the strap padding I used some leftover Bosal handbag foam from Wawak.

Construction

The instructions started off ok, but by the time I was starting to finish up the bag I realized there was a major error. Unfortunately there are no line drawings or sample photos of the back of this backpack, so I didn’t know what was happening until the very end when I went to turn under the top hem where the grommets are set it and realized I was going to be sewing it into the reinforced section with the straps and hanging loop. I had to figure out what went wrong, then unpick the entire section and try sewing it again. I was not happy.

Take note of the illustration under G. FLAP AND HANGER LOOP TO DAY PACK.

See how it has you place the flap with the cut edge on the line? That is wrong! If you sew it like that you’re going to have that issue of the entire strap and loop section being in the way when you go to sew the drawstring hem.

Instead, you want to place the angled part of the flap on top of the line and sew over that. Basically transfer that line which they tell you to use as a cutting line for the flap to the other aide as well, only don’t cut through it. Note in the photo below my chalked in white lines to the side of the flap and how my stitching line goes right at that angled part of the flap.

Here’s what it looks like when the reinforcement patch is finally sewn on.

The instructions also have you do 10 grommets, but I ended up doing only eight.

Conclusion

I will be honest, I don’t like this bag. I feel like it’s smaller than I expected, not just in size but like my frame is almost too big for it. You can see how the straps just barely fit me despite being nearly let out completely, and I’m not even wearing a coat, just a sweatshirt. I don’t have this issue with any of my purchased backpacks. It also feels like the bottom is caving in against my back instead of staying flat. The entire balance feels off.

I think another part of my dislike is how the poorly edited instructions caused me more time and work than it should have taken, which caused negative feeling about this project before it was even done. I ended up giving it to my son. It’s way too big for him but he loves filling it with his stuffed animals and dragging it all around the house!

This was kind of a spur of the moment project for me. I wanted to do something a little different from garment sewing and decided to venture into bagmaking. My toddler has been maxing out his diaper bag lately between potty training but still using diapers, bigger clothes, snacks, etc. I’ve been keeping a backpack in the car with the lesser used stuff and a medium size LL Bean tote for his more frequently used stuff and have been wanting to consolidate into one bag because I also tend to keep some of my own stuff in his diaper bag. This pattern was attractive to me because it is simple and uses minimal speciality materials.

Background

The Rugged Tote and Portfolio from The Green Pepper is an unlined tote bag with optional exterior pockets, a zipped interior pocket, and D-ring for keys. You can use either webbing or self fabric for the straps, which come in regular and long lengths. The bottom of the bag is actually a double layer of fabric, as a separate bag bottom is sewn onto the main body of the tote. If you made it out of 25 oz canvas it would be very similar to the LL Bean Boat and Tote.

The tote and portfolio styles use the same pattern pieces. The only difference is that you sew the corners of the bag into a triangle at the end to make the tote version.

There are four tote sizes, listed below as height x width x depth:

• Small: 11.75” x 9.5” x 5”
• Medium: 13.25” x 13” x 6”
• Large: 15” x 16.5” x 7.5”
• Extra-large: 16” x 19” x 8.5”

These roughly correspond to the size of the LL Bean Boat and Tote bags.

I made the extra large tote with the long straps and all of the optional pockets and D-ring.

Materials

Recommended fabrics are sturdy midweight to heavyweight fabrics like denim, canvas, and Cordura.

I used a midweight black 100% cotton twill I had in my stash for over ten years. For the straps I used nylon webbing. The zipper is a #5 nylon coil zipper from Wawak that was also in my stash. I used Gutermann Mara 70 thread for all construction.

The keyring was a 1.25” D-ring I’ve had in my stash forever from Bagmakers Supply.

Construction

I thought the included instructions were pretty good. I just was working very late at night and got confused about the zipper and how the ends of it were secured close until I went further along and realized that the inside strap actually covers it.