Fun Back Packs for Summer or for School

A month or so ago I made some backpacks I forgot to share.  With some minor changes, they would be fun for school.  My family has gotten into triathlons.  Most of my siblings and spouses do one or two of the short ones each year.  Some of our children are getting old enough to want to do them as well.  So we decided to have our own -- for all the kids around here. 

Each of the adults were in charge of something different.  I designed t-shirts and had them printed.  My sister was in charge of making up the goodie bag.  Last minute I couldn't let the kids get their goodies in a plastic bag so I made these back packs.  I think there ended up being 18 of them. 

I started with a tutorial from Make it and Love it for their "Easy as Cinch" bag.  HERE's the link.

I couldn't handle opening up a seam to sew the straps bag in so I came up with another idea that turned out well.  I sewed diagonally across each corner so I could put the tie through a grommet.  I just eyeballed that diagonal seam.  That was fine.  I did get larger grommets and cotton clothesline which worked better -- except last minute I didn't have what I needed to put the large grommets into the fabric.  We just mangled the large ones. 

That's the only thing I would change -- use larger grommets (or eyelets) so I could have used the cotton clothesline as the straps.  Also, if you were making this for a school bag, you would probably want to line it or use heavier fabric and make it bigger. 

Anyway, we stuffed these bags with all sorts of goodies.  This is the only picture I got of what was inside.  Yes, my sister made sure there was lots of stuff the kids would like besides water.  Now the kids drag them all over the place filled with all sorts of treasures.

Love my baby's fat feet there.  My babies all have fat feet.  I love it!  She was asleep on a blanket.  Guess her feet wanted to play in the grass.