In my *real world* job, I help clients find their next new home and/or help them sell their existing home. The entire time I am dealing with people, I am carefully watching for indications of favourite colours, trends, interests, tastes and anything else I can pick up from them (unknowingly of course). I then utilize this information to come up with a tailored and personalized closing gift.
Like this Beach Bag.
Which is for Deb (same name, cool eh?), who LOVES flip flops. She has the largest collection of actual flip flops I have ever seen in one household, along with flip flop nic knacks, a flip flop table lamp, flip flop wall mounted decor, and many other things. If it is in the shape of a flip flop, then she pretty much has it. So it wasn’t hard to come up with an idea for a closing gift.
During my last trip Stateside a month ago, I hit up JoAnn’s Fabric stores as I was certain they would have some flip flop fabric. To my surprise, the one and only pattern that they used to carry was long discontinued. Dang it. Next step was the internet. What a wonderful thing it is too. In no time I found a website (www.fabric.com) that carried oodles of fabrics depicting flip flops in a variety of colours and backgrounds.
Perfect. With the fabric chosen and ordered, I set about coming up with a pattern to use. I did have one that I had used before, but wanted something larger to hold more towels, lotion, books, sunglasses, camera, etc. I located several on-line, but couldn’t make up my mind which one would be best so ended up taking ideas from 2 different patterns and incorporating them into one.
Here is how it turned out….
The bag is fully lined and features two inside pockets, one on each side and 2 outer pockets on each end with elastic encased in the seam allowance along the top to hold things in.
I also made a zippered cosmetic case, attaching via a tether that you can un-clip to use in your purse. Finished dimensions are 14″ high x 17 1/2″ wide x 11″ depth. Pretty darn roomy. I will be adding some additional goodies inside the bag before I deliver it next week and I know she will absolutely go nuts for it.
Meanwhile, I think I am going to make another one for myself, after all Mexico is coming up soon 😉
Deborah
P.S. I will be detailing how I made this one for a future blog post.
Love this one! I have used my black and white one to death. I just love it and it seems to hold most all that I need for a day on the lake or at the beach. She will love hers too!
I am so glad to hear you are still using yours 🙂 I do love the classy look of that black/white one, it is so you 🙂
Great bag to take to Mexico
Thanks! that’s the plan Rhoda 😉