In August I shared that I had cut out all of the pieces for the lunch bags and was starting to put them together.

I did a lot of thinking about the best way to do this because I wanted to use my time efficiently. I wanted to rethread my sewing machine as few times as possible. Would it make sense to sew each lunch bag together completely before moving on? Or should I do all of them to a certain point?

Because I wanted to switch the thread on the sewing machine as little as possible I figured that once I started sewing the binding onto the seams I would want the thread to match the lining.

Since I only had two colors of lining I decided I would do all of the lunch bags with each color as one group. So all of the gray interior bags were done first (because that’s the lining that was on top of my pile). I sewed all the pieces together and got them to the point where you start binding the seams.

Once all 12 gray lined bags were to this point it only took about an hour and a half to finish sewing them together. I should have had them done a lot faster, but my supervisor kept interrupting me.

Despite the constant whining (from me, not Bob), I finally finished the first twelve lunch bags!

They are far from perfect, but I have to keep reminding myself that guys who don’t sew will be receiving them. They probably won’t notice the imperfections.

I liked doing it this way because knowing that I only had a few more steps left for each bag helped it go a lot faster. Having the straps made so that they just had to be attached to the bags helped a lot, too. The only problem is that I have to make more. I only have three left.

Which means I’ll be making nine straps AFTER I’ve finished the bags. Right now it’s more important to me that I get the bags assembled. This is the state of the last twelve bags:

The tops and sides are assembled. I just have to sew them together (which is one of the trickier parts), add the insulation, then finish sewing them together.

I want these to be ready by the first Tuesday in December. That’s the night I’ve scheduled for my small faith group to stuff them with lots of good tasting snacks. I have a month… hopefully that will be enough time!