Scaling the Summit (Pack)

We had a couple of early October snow hits and it was like winter here!

On occasion, I get inspired to make a project as soon as I see the pattern. My last two bag projects were precisely that way, and oddly enough, they were both sling bags: my customized Summer Sling courtesy of Sew4Home and this Summit Pack that you see here, the pattern for which I reviewed in my last post.

If you consider the day that I purchased the pattern as day 1, I was finished making the bag by day 10. That's still certainly more tortoise than hare if it was an actual race, but it was a pretty fast turnaround by my standards. And like I said last week, this is not a typical bag pattern that you can just "run with" based on existing knowledge.

Planning

During the first three days, I selected my fabrics and contemplated what I might add or change. I decided that I wouldn't be altering much, given how different this bag is. Oh, and of course, I read through the pattern carefully to ensure that I understood the basic process.

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A Day of Cutting Fabric

Here is what I accomplished by the afternoon of day 4. You may recognize a couple of the Robert Kaufman fabrics here from previous projects like my cousin's wallet and my hubby's Gadget Grab 'n' Go.

It took hours just to cut and lay out the templates... 

Since I don't have an extensive fabric stash, I try to use up leftovers with each new project, pairing them up with something fresh. The coordinating Satsuki Japanese Flower in beige was the new selection here. It has an interesting gradient pattern running from selvage to selvage; depending on where you cut, it can look like two different fabrics.

Two Days of Cutting & Fusing Interfacing

I was still more or less in this mode by the afternoon of day 5... cutting. This time it was the interfacing pieces.

On day 6, I fused the interfacing onto all of my pieces. And in doing so, I made the first of my changes; I used one layer of Decor Bond for everything instead of the double application of Shapeflex. I don't have any Shapeflex on hand and the need to buy 4 yards of it (!) to accommodate this was a deal-breaker. (How did the substitution perform? It resulted in a firm bag that stands up by itself, which I personally don't mind. That said, next time — if there is a next time — I will try fusible fleece for a softer finish. In any case, I don't know what a double layer of Shapeflex would feel like in comparison...)

For the back panel and for the inside gadget pocket, the pattern calls for Flex Foam or Soft and Stable. Instead, I used some of my melton blanket remnants, last seen in my tablet envelope project. To address the lack of fusibility, my fabric glue (Tailorform's Sew No More) came to the rescue.

As you might guess, I'm a big proponent of making do with what you have on hand.

Day 7: First Day of Sewing

Did some solid sewing on day 7...

Three main pieces finished on day 7...

... although I had this curious outcome. Pretty sure I cut these correctly and folded the card slots correctly, but there you go. Whatever the cause, this problem was fairly easy to fix.

Oops...?

The strap would have been sewn this day if I were constructing the bag in order. However, I was still trying to decide how to make my strap, since I didn't have a slider and my D ring and swivel clip hardware was 3/4" wide instead of 1".

My final bit of sewing on day 7 was the custom pocket on top of the front zippered pocket.

Adding a fifth zipper to the mix!

The zipper was recovered from an old purse; I attached one of my zippiest zipper pulls to it, switching out the original pull so I could add it to my other white zipper to create a double pull.

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Day 8: The Zipper Conundrum

The morning of day 8 was when I had my minor confusion over which zipper was meant for where.

The above is from the pattern's materials listing...

Just for the record (in case I'm not the only confused one), the shorter zipper is meant for the smaller pocket on the lower front of the bag. The longer zipper is the one under the zipper cover strip.

However, do you think that just the shorter zipper is meant to have the larger pull and wide zipper tape? Or is that phrase meant to describe "purse zippers" in general and therefore applicable to both zippers? I now think it's the latter, while at the time that I was putting this together, I believed the former.

Meanwhile, here is the beginning of my "zipper problem"...

The start of my zipper issues... I went ahead and used a very small seam allowance!

The pattern says to use a 3/8" to 1/2" zipper seam allowance, depending on zipper. (So we are back to that zipper conundrum... what kind of zipper should we be using?)

Keep in mind that a regular #3 zipper is only 3mm — the width of the zipper teeth — above an inch wide. A #5 zipper is bigger, but not really by a whole lot. To sew with a 3/8" to 1/2" seam allowance on the zipper tape means you're getting very close to the zipper teeth... almost impossibly close if you are trying to manage with a regular #3 zipper.

It's always been my preference to have more of my zipper tape showing than not, so I've always tended to sew my zippers with a 1/4" or smaller seam allowance. Not a good move in this case, since I ended up with a front piece that didn't fit the backing piece, as you can see here. (The top of the picture shows the backing piece extending beyond the front. Then along the bottom of the bag, the front piece was considerably longer than the backing piece.)

No amount of pulling was going to make this mismatched pair fit!

Long story short, use #5 (or #4.5 if you can find them) zippers for both "purse zippers" and ensure that you sew as close to the recommended seam allowance as possible. I ultimately fixed my issue by removing and then re-installing the longer zipper.

By the way, if anyone is uncertain about what it means to "make snips in the zipper tape", it refers to making small cuts like this to help ease your zipper around curved areas.

Making small cuts along your zipper tape makes it much easier to curve around something!

I called it a day after determining that I'd have to rip out and reinstall at least one of the main zippers. In that sort of situation, it's a good idea to step away and come back with a fresh outlook.

Day 9: Onward & Upward

Here is my front panel and backing piece fitting much better on day 9!

Bottom and side edge now sewn together... yay!

Here is the rest of my day 9 progress... attaching the side and bottom pieces to both exterior and lining. As you can see, clips are your friends for this project; pins won't do the job through all those layers!

Progressing smoothly towards the end...

You may have heard this before, but it's worth repeating: learn to go with your gut. The zipper cover piece did not call for any interfacing and I kept thinking that I should add some... right up until the time I sewed the piece on — without any interfacing. The result feels very flimsy and if I had to do it all over again, I would fuse some interfacing onto half of that piece. (This is if you're using a quilting cotton. I would probably add a strip of interfacing to the top 1" underneath each of the card slots for the same reason.) Speaking of the zipper cover, I used my accent fabric for it since I did not have enough of the main fabric.

Day 10: Finishing

All that was left for day 10 was to attach the back panels, the strap (which in my case hadn't been made yet), the strap tab and then do what seemed like an inconceivable task given the thickness of everything: turn the whole contraption right side out!

In the process of doing all that, I also wanted to add a loop at the top for hanging, an interior key clip, and a pen or sunglasses loop.

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I ultimately made the strap more or less per the pattern, except that I didn't install a slider to make it adjustable. I knew this bag was going to be for me so I sized it just for me and used a couple of snap fasteners to provide two "settings": one for regular over the (right) shoulder use and one for over the chest (for when I'm riding a bike for instance). I made the bottom part of the strap (and the strap tab) just a tiny bit narrower so that I could use the hardware that I had on hand.

Oh, I also added some of my melton blanket to the top part of the strap for padding and would highly recommend doing that with whatever foam stabilizer you use.

I salvaged this key clip from hubby's old sling bag and attached it to the top of the main compartment...

Originally, I had planned to "split" the card slot patch pocket assembly to accommodate a pen, but didn't know how easy it would be to access once everything was put together. So instead, I just attached a simple loop to the inside edge of the main opening. Here it is with my sunglasses hanging from it, but it can do double duty for a pen.

My loop for sunglasses and/or a pen...

Once everything was attached — including the strap of course — the final process was to sew on the lining piece of the back panel and then turn it all right side out through the back zippered pocket.

Sewing on the exterior back panel was challenging enough... adding this lining piece was a feat!

Doesn't this look like a big samosa?? Happily, my sewing machine did not complain about the thickness here!

I was too busy using up all of my strength pulling out the bag to stop and take a picture of the whole turning process, but it did get accomplished, obviously. I was then able to give it a good steam and press to remove most of the creases. The main interior back panel has some creasing that I can't get out, but that's partly due to the nature of Decor Bond. (It shows more on light coloured fabrics, which is one of the reasons why I prefer to use dark prints on my exteriors.)

Completed Summit Pack... well worth the effort!

All in all, the project was worth the effort. (And it truly wasn't that difficult.) I'm very happy with my Summit Pack. Hopefully this post provides some useful information for anyone considering making one.