Thursday, July 30, 2009

Pencil Bags for Everybody!

Hello!

I have not blogged in a long, long time. I have not sewn in a long, long time. But I did get to...

fly to Hawaii with friends for six days!
hang out at day camp with twenty two ghetto and now not-so-cliquey eighth graders that really grew on me and the messiest and nicest group of counselors ever!
celebrate my cousin's wedding!
schedule for my first semester at Berkeley!
go on the annual lam fam camping trip!
and now I get to relax, reunite with friends, sleep... and SEW!

Here is today's project:

and now, for the first time ever-- a tutorial! So now we can all have identical pencil bags. I like these because you can make them out of small scraps of fabric that aren't big enough for anything else. Also, if you go out and buy a yard, you could make a million of these pencil bags with just that one yard.  There's very little sewing involved, so you could probably make this by hand relatively fast. And they're really easy to make tutorials on...

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(1) Cut out 2 rectangles from the fabric you want on the outside of the bag (thicker fabric is better for keeping the shape of the bag) and 2 more rectangles from the fabric you want to line the inside of the bag. For a small bag, use 6"x8", for a large one, use 6"x12".

(2) Stack each lining rectangle (checkered) on top of the outer fabric rectangle (leafy.) Hem one long side in about 1/4" for both stacks.

(3) Sew the hemmed side onto the zipper like so!

(4) Flip over.

(5) Fold in half, sew along the side opposite the zipper, about 1/4" from the edge.

(6) Match up the part you just sewed with the zipper so that it lays flat like this.

(7) Flip over. Sew along the two open sides. Try to get the lines you sew to go perpendicular to the zipper at the zipper's endpoints. Yeah.

(8) Cut off the extra fabric from the sides you just sewed so it'll be less bulky inside.

(9) Unzip the bag, reach inside, and fold each corner flat (into a triangle.) Sew along the base of each of the four triangles. The length of the base will be the height of the pencil bag.

(10) Flip inside out and fill the bag with all sorts of little trinkets.

And the pencil bag I have been holding onto since 8th grade broke, so this one will replace it!
okay go make pencil bags for all your friends now.

3 comments:

Christina said...

Hi Ally!

I have a question. Do you sew by hand or by machine? Just wondering.

And this tutorial is really awesome! And you're really awesome! And inspiring-- I always feel like sewing after I read your blog. :)

Christina

Mabel said...

LEGIT.

christina said...

hey, do you take orders??? how much do you want for the pencil bags????? and for all the other cute stuff you make??

-(cousin) christina