With the recent warm weather and sunshine, a lot of our customers are making pretty summer dresses and accessories using fabric such as our cottons, which include a lot of floral prints and bright colours. One of the most popular items that our customers choose to make are bags, and in today's blog post we'll be covering how to make a cute summer tote bag, perfect for taking to the beach or on a shopping trip - perhaps even to one of our stores to buy more sewing and crafting supplies! What you'll need: - 1 metre of fabric for the outside of the bag - 1 metre of dress lining for the inside of the bag - A reel of cotton - A pair of bag handles - Optional items for embellishing (e.g. buttons, acrylic jewels, embroidery thread, bias binding and trims, fabric paint/markers etc.) Step 1 First, you need to decide how big you would like to make your bag - we have chosen to make ours 40cm x 40cm, and those are the measurements that we will be using during this tutorial. We recommend fabrics such as our cotton prints or our cotton plains, or even our craft cottons. Lay your outer fabric down flat, and lay your dress lining down flat on top of it. Fold it in half, then measure and mark out  a square that is about 45cm x 45cm - this is to allow for seams. Step 2 Using your markings, cut the square that you just measured. You should now have four pieces - two in your outer fabric, and two in your dress lining. With right sides together, pin your two squares in your outer fabric together and sew on three edges. Do the same with your dress lining. Turn the piece made of your outer fabric right side out. Place your dress lining piece (which should still be inside out) inside your outer fabric piece. Step 3 Using your remaining outer fabric, cut a strip about 8cm wide. Fold it in half with right sides together and sew it, then turn it right side out so that you are left with a strip that measures about 4cm wide. Cut this piece into four, then hem the open edges. These pieces will be what you use to attach your bag handles to your bag. Step 4 Fold the un-sewn edges of your outer fabric and dress lining over, and over again to make a neat edge - pin into place. Estimate where your bag handles are going to sit in comparison to the top edges of your bag. Take two of the four 4cm strips you previously made and pin one end to the pinned top edge of your bag (pin it on the inside of the bag for a more neat finish overall). Loop around the bag handle and match the second end of your strip to the first end, and pin into place. Do this with all four strips. Step 5 Sew the top edge of your bag closed, making sure that your stitch runs over the strips of fabric holding your bag handles in place. Your tote bag is now finished! OPTIONAL: If you choose to decorate the outside of your bag, we recommend doing this during Step 2 of our tutorial before you insert the dress lining piece into your outer piece. You can use all sorts of items to embellish your bag, such as buttons and acrylic jewels, trims and embroidery thread, or perhaps even fabric paint and markers. A great fabric to use for painting and drawing on is our calico, which we have several different kinds of available both on our website and by phone. Don't forget to share photos of your creations on our Facebook page!