Canvas Shopping Bag

Recently I have started to use my own bags when I go shopping instead of the shops own plastic carrier bags. In this age of recycling and trying to reduce plastic waste its something we all need to think about. You can buy bags from most supermarkets and chain stores now for this purpose, but what about altering or improving a plain canvas one, I got mine from http://www.bakerross.co.uk/ they come in packs of six and are the perfect size to pop in your handbag so you have it with at all times. Enjoy, love Trish xxx First I inked mine with Tim Holtz distress inks, daubing them onto a craft mat, spraying with a little water and wiping and dabbing the bag onto it, heat set the inks and kept re applying the ink until I was happy with the result. I put in outside to dry off completely, when it was dry I rinsed it out so the inks were more faded. While the bag was drying I used Adirondack archival and distress ink to colour a piece of linen fabric, again I allowed this to dry then rinsed it out. I wanted to use the phrase ‘I love shopping’ in a few different languages and with the help of a friend and http://translation.langenberg.com/ I found nine other languages to use, I copied and pasted them into a word document and changed the fonts and font sizes until I was happy then printed them out onto the linen fabric, cut out each phrase and sewed them onto my bag, using a few flowers for extra decoration. You could also use fabric dye to colour your bag completely, use the tie dye method for a retro look or leave it the base colour and decorate it with silk flowers, buttons, ribbons or anything else you have lying around in your stash, let your imagination run riot. I look forward to seeing the pictures of your funky new shopping bags, please leave a link in the comments section.