an Orla Kiely beach bag

I can’t go out to the island without a beach bag, right? For those of you who don’t already know, Morgan and I are getting married on an small island in Southwest Florida. We head out there on Tuesday, and I plan on lovely days of relaxing on the beach. I hadn’t thought to bring a beach bag, so I decided to make one out of the cute Orla Kiely dishtowels I bought the other day.

They come in packs of two – one printed and one solid. I opted for these cute pears for the outside, with the corresponding olive green fabric for the lining. I made it as large as I could, based on the size of the towels, and it ended up a generous 20″ across by about 14″ tall. It has a large 6″ rectangular bottom, a large divided interior pocket and a little twill tie at the top.

Is it sad that I can’t go away without feeling the need to sew? Luckily my mom had thought to bring her old sewing machine to Florida with her, so I could feed my addiction. I was lacking on the tools – just an old pair of scissors and a tape measure and ironing board… it makes you realize how quickly you come to rely on the conveniences of rotary cutters, cutting mats and plastic rulers… not to mention a built in thread cutter on the sewing machine (I really did miss that feature!)

Anyway, it turned out just as I had hoped… And I love it!