This backpack is so beautiful! What first struck me is the fabric! So I made my complement of awe to Stephanie and do you know what she said? This fabric is just plain canvas. But….. Stephanie spent hours painting the canvas to make it just right.

You can see in the second picture just how she created the flowers on the flap and the backside.

Oh. and look at all the hardware she used: swivel clips, d rings, rivets/grommets, and plastic slides.

This project was well planned so you can only guess how long it took to make? 12 hours! Wow, what patience. (I can imagine this does not include the shopping time to pick out all the supplies.) The bag is a little smaller than a regular backpack, about 12″ wide and 16″ tall. Stephanie plans to use it for the summer and made it just large enough to fit her sketchbook, sweater and water bottle.

Stephanie is the woman behind Soluci where she provides a little bit of handmade, vintage, and craft items.

(If you’d like your craft project featured on Tantalizing Stitches, please contact el@tantalizingstitches.com .)

Here are a two very detailed tutorials on how to make an adjustable strap. Creating an adjustable strap is a little tricky because you have to weave in both the adjustable slide and rectangle ring in the correct position. However, these two tutorials do a great job in explaining when and how to weave in the adjustable slide and rectangle ring.

Materials:

1. 1 Adjustable Slide (The width of the slide must be the width of your handle)
2. Fabric (2 to 4 times as wide as the finished handle) or webbing
3. 1 Connection piece (This is most traditionally a rectangle ring but this can be an o ring or d ring as well)
4. Optional 2 connection piece (To make the finished bag balanced, you may want to add the second connection piece. this is not required because you can just sew one side of the handle directly onto your bag. This optional piece is marked #4 on the second tutorial.)

If you are a very visual person, this is a great youtube video created by Homespun Threads.

If you like step by step written instructions, I have found this tutorial at DIY Bag Patterns very nicely written up.

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At Tantalizing Stitches, you can find bag making supplies such as rectangle rings, slides, o rings, d rings, and much more. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact el@tantalizingstitches.com.

The current Canada post strike has caused havoc for small online businesses around the world. Besides the fact that Canadian based online stores have had to close their doors, most online businesses, especially U.S. based online businesses, that have many Canadian customers are losing hours stressed out over the Canadian post strike.

I have tried alternatives to USPS / Canada post and they just are not viable. With packages weighing less than one pound and with a value of less than $100, UPS and FedEx charge an arm and a leg for both delivery and customs fees. For example, when sent by UPS, one customer was charged more in customs fees than the price of the item.

When people think about postal delivery perhaps they just think about the perhaps outdated service of letter delivery, like this article. However, with the development of the internet, postal service has become more than delivery of letters – it now is part of an intricate web of international business.

Perhaps the reason postal services are losing money is because they haven’t made the switch in business model from honing in on paper letters and advertisements to small packages and parcels. I am not sure. But what I am sure of is that postal service is necessary in the expanding online world of ecommerce.

If you want to remove the “As low as” price on the catalog view, then edit:
app\design\frontend\

\template\bundle\catalog\product\price.phtml

If your theme does not have this file, copy it from:
app\design\frontend\base\default\template\bundle\catalog\product\price.phtml

Then, comment out the code surrounding: <p class=”minimal-price”> ….. </p>

Read more about making changes to Magento for your Bundled Product configuration.

If your shop is set up anything like the TS shop, you don’t want that pesky quantity box at the bottom of your “Bundled Product”. There is an easy way to fix this – get rid of it in all your “Bundled Product” item pages. This is what aclever magento forum poster, tzyganu, suggested in this post.

To do this, you will need to edit your template. Go to this file:
app/design/frontend/”your_interface”/”your_theme”/template/catalog/product/view/addtocart.phtml

Save a copy of this file as addtocart.phtml.bak.

Now, edit the original file. Look for: “<!–?php if(!$_product—>isGrouped()”. Also, find the <!–?php endif; ?–>. In between these two, you should find a <label> and a</label>.

Delete this entire code and insert:
<!–?php if(!$_product—>isGrouped() &amp;&amp; $_product-&gt;getTypeId() != Mage_Catalog_Model_Product_Type::TYPE_BUNDLE): ?&gt;
<label for=”qty”><!–?php echo $this—>__(‘QTY’) ?&gt;:</label>

<input id=”qty” maxlength=”12″ name=”qty” type=”text” value=”&lt;?php echo $this-&gt;getMinimalQty($_product)== null?1:$this-&gt;getMinimalQty($_product) ?&gt;” />

<!–?php endif; ?–>

Now, double check your your work by visiting the product page of your bundle product and place the item in your shopping cart. Is the price coming up correctly? If not, it may be because you have set a minimum quantity greater than 1.

To fix this, go to “System” -&gt; “Configuration”.

Then go to the “Catalog” section on the left side and click “Inventory”.

Under “Product Stock Options” you will find “Minimum Qty Allowed in Shopping Cart”. Make sure there is nothing inserted there.

Your Bundled Product should now work without the quantity box in the item page.

Please let me know if you have any questions by leaving a comment below!

The TS shop is run on the open source Magento platform. I am proud to say that with the exception of one instance, I have been able to fix my shop all by myself. Yes, I am a proud DIYer.

Like any other shop software, I run into problems. When I do, I immediately do a search and sometimes I find the answer. The hard part is figuring out the lingo people use regarding the issue at hand.

Today, for the first time, I tried setting up a “bundled item” to allow my customers to mix different finishes or sizes in one listing and get the bulk rate. I had several obstacles:

1. No easy way to provide a bulk rate discount. SOLUTION: Set up “Shopping Cart Price Rules” – see below
2. Input quantity provided at bottom of my product page. SOLUTION: Manually edit the template – see the upcoming June 8 post
3. “As low as” price displays preconfigured low price. SOLUTION: Remove “As low as” price – see the upcoming June 10 post
4. No minimum quantity for the “bundled item”. SOLUTION: – coming soon

1. BULK RATE DISCOUNT VIA “Shopping Cart Price Rules”
This is a little tricky. My ideal price rules are such that when a customer purchases 100, they get a price break. Then, 240. Then, 600.

To make something like this, I first had to determine the total price of 100 pieces at the normal price. So if the normal price is $1/piece, 100 pieces would be $100. 240 pieces would be $240. 600 pieces would be $600.

Now, after logging into the admin side of Magento, create your bundled product via Catalog –> Manage Products. Remember to SKU for that product.

Note that because I have three price levels, I will be making three rules.
Look for PROMOTIONS –> Shopping Cart Price Rules.

Click “Add New Rule.”

Fill in the “Rule Information” based on your own parameters.

In “Conditions”, click on the “+” and then choose “Product Attribute Combination”.

Click the “+” directly below and choose “SKU”. Type in the SKU of the bundled product.

A. Again, click the “+” directly below and choose “Price in Cart”. Type in the price of 100 pieces ($100). Then, change the “is” to “equal or greater than”.

B. Again, click the “+” directly below and choose “Price in Cart”. Type in the price of 240 pieces ($240). Then, change the “is” to “less than”.

Now click “Save Rule.”

C. Now, go to “Actions.” I chose “Apply Percent of product price discount”. Then after determining what price you want per piece, you insert the percentage discount.

At the bottom, you will see “Apply the rule only to cart items matching the following conditions (leave blank for all items)”. Below that, click the “+” and choose “SKU”. Insert the SKU of your bundled product.

The second and third rule will be created very similarly. Name each rule with a slightly different name. The difference will be the numbers you include in sections A, B, and C above. For your last and final rule, omit section B.

After everything is finished, make sure to double check by placing the items in the cart at the respective quantity levels.

If you have any questions, please feel free to submit them in the comments below!

I just started on Pinterest just a couple of days ago and found so many inspirational images and tutorials. If you haven’t joined, you should try it out. Feel free to add me.

My favorite pins include ANIMALS, food, DIY TUTORIALS, bags, and bag patterns.