As I have said before, most of the straps come with the ends sewn back on themselves. If you have been looking at my bags at all you will have noticed that I  have used these tabs as style elements. Here is a new idea I came up with to do just that. These pictures show two bags, fronts and backs.

I have been approached by many people I do not know looking to buy one of my bags. I have never sold a single one of the hundreds I have made. I have just given them to friends, family, coworkers and acquaintances. In order to let everyone have a shot at getting a bag, I have decided to try putting one up on Ebay. I have placed a minimum that will cover the shipping so I have no intentions of making money on this. It is just a way to let anyone in the country have a shot at one. Let’s see how it goes.

Click on this link to see the Ebay offering:

http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_trksid=p2050601.m570.l1313.TR0.TRC0&_nkw=Badtadmd&_sacat=0&_from=R40

I asked Anya to share a picture of herself with the bag I made her for winning last month’s contest. Here she is as well as pictures of the bag.

Not everything you can do with repurposed material needs to be fancy or daring. I had a pant hanger made of metal. My pants kept slipping off of it. After I figured out how to get a trauma strap cover to stay on it, the pants now stay in place.

When I make a bag, I start by cutting out a bottom the size and shape of the bag I have in mind. I long ago recognized that sewing the double thickness bottoms one at a time was very inefficient. If I have a sheet of the material sewn up ahead of time, it helps me get started a lot faster on a new bag.

I have also been frustrated with three big bins of straps of various sizes that needed organizing to be more useful.

To address both of these issues, I spent several hours over the weekend organizing and sewing straps into big sheets for bag bottoms, both yellow and orange. Here are the sheets I came up with so I am now ready to take off making more bags when I have time and inclination.

Thanks to everyone who contributed to my first annual Get a Bag Contest  I announced last month. A lot of people sent in many wonderful ideas. Some of them like sexy night wear and prom dresses will probably stay on the drawing board indefinitely but some of the others have my mind going already!

Anya is the winner of the contest. She sent in a lot of great ideas and here is what I made with one of them. It is a belt case that will hold both my Leatherman and my trauma shears, which I usually hang from a retractable key ring on my belt. As I have mentioned before, sewing little things is pretty tricky and I had to go through several tries before I got it right. Big problem: no room for one of my BadTadMD patches!

I had a little extra time this week (my computer was in the shop) so I was able to come up with these. I am about at the end of my blue straps so watch for new color combinations.

Natacha is headed to Houston to do an aerospace fellowship. She will be learning how to be a doctor for astronauts and other NASA folks. She will now be able to do so with a nice Tad Bag. Is she happy about getting the bag or about leaving for Houston?

Every strap his folded backwards and sewn to itself. That makes a kind of tab that I have learned to use in my designs. They usually just end up randomly on the bags. Here is another bag made from only the ends of orange straps. The positions of the tabs is totally random.

Front

Back

Generally speaking, the smaller the item, the harder it is for me to sew. I was able to plan ahead so this was not that hard. I got it right on just the second try. It hangs around her neck and is just big enough for the phone to sit in snuggly yet be easily accessible. Very handy for Health Center Managers who don’t always have pockets and don’t like to carry a purse!

Here it is around her neck, with name badge attached.

Here you can see it with the phone showing.

When not at work, the badge comes off for civilian use.

Again, with the phone showing.