Old T-shirt = New Bag

While collecting white t-shirts for my latch-hook t-shirt rug (I still need so many more...) I acquired a few t-shirts that I don't need but won't work for my project. Not wanting to just get rid of them I decided to try my hand at making bags out of them.

I've only done one so far but might start making a bunch of t-shirt bags - a few for each car, some for the house, one for my purse, etc. I always make sure to bring a bag shopping and these are pretty small so they'd be handy to bring.

Supplies:
-T-Shirt
-Scissors
-Sewing machine or needle/thread

To start I cut off the sleeves (to form handles). I cut right on the edge of the seam so that once the sleeves were cut off I had a raw t-shirt edge for the handles. To make the bag opening bigger I cut away an oval of material around the collar. I just cut and hoped for the best but you could also use a big bowl to outline the opening if you want to make sure it's even.

I flipped the shirt inside out and sewed along the bottom of the shirt. I sewed across the bottom twice for extra strength.

This bag was made from a small t-shirt but if you have a bigger one and don't want the bag to be too big you can trim off some of the bottom fabric to make the bag shorter.

To make the handles look a little nicer I cut two short strips of material from the sleeves and sewed them around the tops of the handles. I think it added a nice touch. :-)

Here is the finished bag!

I've already used it and it worked well. I bought two bike seats and a candle - everything fit into it and the bottom was strong. The nice thing abotu t-shirt material is that it stretches so you can fit more in the bag.

I am definitely going to make more out of the random old t-shirts I have laying around the house.