As some of you may recall, one of my goals from last summer was to make a bag. Like all of my other goals from last summer, this goal remained unachieved. Until now.

A crazy wind has swept in, bringing with it a new wave of inspiration. First I cleaned my room during winter break, throwing out three heavy duty garbage bags of heavy duty crap in the process, as well as checking one item off of my Do Something Extraordinary list. Then I knit a new scarf (okay, I crocheted it, but I did knit a scarf for Ben for his birthday). Then I got my Driver License (though I haven’t actually driven since my road test). And now… well, now I’ve gone and outdone myself. The crowning achievement of my life has been accomplished, and from this point onward all other achievements will pale in comparison.

I made a bag out of duct tape.

Now I’m sure you’re all picturing an ugly, misshapen blob of silver-grey, wrestled into a vaguely container-like shape. But that would be half-assing it, and I was not going to half-ass this, my friends.

You see, Ben gave me as a birthday gift, in addition to a box of 48 Cadbury Creme Eggs (*drool*), five rolls of different colored duct tape (red, blue, green, white and yellow). Most people, upon receiving this, would probably erase the giver from their address books. But I am weird and, as a result, I enjoy weird gifts. And I was determined to make something interesting of this one.

I had seen people make duct tape wallets before, but that did not provide extensive enough a canvas for me to experiment with, especially since I had five rolls of duct tape. That would be a lot of wallets, taking into consideration that I am a broke college student and barely have enough money to put into one wallet.

So I decided to make a bag. A tote bag was my initial idea, but I realized that a bag with no closure at the top would be nearly useless in Ithaca’s precipitative clime. A messenger bag was the next-easiest project, because it really only consisted of three pieces plus a shoulder strap, and had the added benefit of a flap to keep out the rain.

I started out by laying out long strips of plain silver duct tape (for the inside) sticky side up on the floor, overlapping slightly along the long edges. This formed a large and dangerously sticky panel. I then laid strips of blue and green duct tape on the panel, in the direction perpendicular to the silver tape (for added strength). This rectangle became the front part of the bag. I made the back panel/front flap the same way, slightly more than doubling it in length so it would fold over the top of the bag and hang down level with the front. (Note: working with large, dangerously sticky panels of duct tape is… well… dangerous. At one point I had both hands and a knee stuck to the panel as I lay on the floor and yelped curses and Meri sat in her bed and laughed at me.)

I then made a long, narrow panel of plain silver duct tape, two strips wide, to serve as the sides and bottom of the bag. I joined it to the front and back panels using the red tape.

I used the remainder of the red tape as edging and to make a strap (two very long strips of silver duct tape stuck together with the red tape on top of it on both sides). I solidly affixed the strap to the bag and reinforced the seams inside the bag with silver. As an afterthought, I added a pocket inside the bag for my wallet/keys/pens and one for my cell phone. And then I was done.

But words cannot do my bag justice. I now present to you photos of my masterpiece (click on the thumbnails for the– you know what, I think you can figure that one out for yourself):

I used it as a bookbag today for the first time, and got quite a few comments of the “Is your bag made out of duct tape??” nature. My friends have all acknowledged that it is the coolest thing I have ever done, and most likely will ever do. I suppose I should just give up now and resign myself to never even attempting anything interesting again. Unless it involves duct tape; then I’ll whip out my scissors and the halls will echo with the periodic, grating noise of duct tape being torn from the roll.