Tutorial: Utensil pouch

I sew a lot, or at least I used to before work took all the time and energy that I had. Now that I am studying again, I have started sewing more as well, as I feel more inspired, and it is a good creative counterweight to my studies.

Anyway, today I finished a UFO (or unfinished object) that has been on my table for over a year. I went on a road trip in the summer of 2018 with my best friends, and at a store I picked up the cutest quilting cotton ever: kittens among sewing and knitting supplies. Even though I had placed a ban on myself from buying fabric, I simply could not resist this one. To top it off, I already knew what I would use it for: a pouch for eating utensils.

Is not that the cutest thing ever?

However I was for some reason unhappy with the pouch I made, ripped out some stitches and then never had the energy to finish it. So it ended up as a UFO in a forgotten corner of my sewing nook. As it resurfaced a while ago it has been nagging me, so earlier today I finished it. And oh the joy. Now I actually have somewhere to put my eating utensils when I go places.

This project was inspired by a video from Shelbizleee, however, I do not remember which one. Shelbizleee creates videos about sustainable living, and if you are interested, the link to her channel is here: https://www.youtube.com/user/Shelbizleee/featured

All rolled up and pretty.

An other huge inspiration, which has seen me pick up and finishing old UFO:s is Bernadette Banner. Berandette makes excellent content regarding historic sewing, so go watch her videos. Here is the specific video of hers that inspired me to start finishing old projects:

The following is an attempt at writing a tutorial for sewing a pouch to carry your eating utensils with you. It could of course also function for pens. Post questions in the comments if anything is unclear.

Utensil pouch

To start off, you are going to need the following materials:

• 60 x 17 cm piece of your chosen fabric, plus the same of lining and interlining (I used a thin batting for interlining to give some stiffness to the pouch without making it too rigid, a sturdier fabric could also work)
• ~1 m edge tape or bias binding for binding the edges
• ~0,6 m ribbon 

On the right I have marked the fold lines, and the dotted line indicates where to fold the edge to. The dashed borderlines here are the edge tape.

1. Start by cutting your fabric, lining and interlining to the same size (60 x 17 cm). Make a sandwich of these with the interlining in the middle. Use pins of clips to hold them in place
2. Sew on bias binding or edge tape to cover the short ends.
3. At one end, fold the fabric over 7 cm from the edge, to create a 7 cm deep pocket there. Attach at the sides.
4. At the other end, fold the fabric over 10 cm from the edge, creating a slightly bigger pocket. Attach at the sides.
5. In the bigger pocket, mark vertical lines and sew these. I made 4 pockets, but you could opt for making 5 instead.
6. Now cover the raw, long edges with bias binding or edge tape. 
7. Put some utensils in the pockets and fold the pouch and roll it up, try to figure out where you want to place the ribbon on the outside. Once you find a point, attach it there and you are done. I decorated mine with a small bow from the same ribbon. 

Insert utensils and you are ready to go!
Here you can see the original binding I used when I started the project, but as I had non of it left, and did not want to buy new for this alone, I used a red satin ribbon to bind the remaining long edges. I used the same ribbon to tie the pouch.

I hope this was helpful. I have another idea for a different style of utensil pouch, and if I make that I will probably add more pockets to this one so that I can use it for pens instead.

Have fun sewing,

~Stella

DIY: Bead embroidered pillowcase - Part 1: constructing the pillowcase

Many blessings!

Darkness has settled over Finland and in this darkness I find that a little bit of creativity brightens up my day. So I will share my latest project: A tutorial for creating beautiful pillowcases with simple embroidery and beads.

This tutorial is in two parts: Part 1 discusses how to construct a pillowcase using three different methods - easy, intermediate and advanced. Part 2 is all about the embroidery and also contains two methods. You do not need a sewing machine to create these but it does help.

So lets jump into this pillow-creation tutorial.

First off, you will need the following:

• A pillow 
• Fabric: enough to cover the pillow plus seam allowances
• Thread
• Needle or sewing machine

Optional (intermediate level):

• Zipper

A note on measurements and seam allowance before we continue: I usually make my pillowcases slightly smaller than the actual pillow to make the pillow seem more plump. I do this especially if I have very soft pillows and I want them to appear a bit firmer. To do that I simply measure the pillow and use these measurements without adding seam allowance. When I sew I use a seam allowance of 1 cm (1,5 cm if the material is prone to fray). If you already have a very firm pillow you will want to add seam allowance to your measurements. I will not mention adding seam allowances separately after this so you will need to observe them yourself if you need them.

METHOD 1 (easy)

This is the easy method of constructing a pillowcase. It requires a little bit of hand sewing at the end and results in a pillowcase that is "permanent" unless you rip out the hand sewn stitches to remove the pillowcase. I would use this for a pillowcase that I do not intend to change, or for one that I can cover with other pillowcases if need be. Thus the inner case would protect the pillow inside further. You could also use this to create tiny decorative pillows or pincushions.

1. Measure your pillow. Mine is 40x40 cm, so I will use that as an example. To cover the entire pillow I will need two pieces of the same size, but instead of cutting two and have more sewing I will cut one piece 40x80 cm in size. 
2. I will fold this in half, right sides together and sew from the folded edge on both sides. Sew up along the open edges and around the top corners for a few cm then stop and secure your stitches.
3. Turn right sides out and insert the pillow, then hand stitch the opening shut. 

Construction of pillowcase in method 1. 

METHOD 2 (intermediate)

This uses the same method of construction as the first one, but inserts a zipper in the opening. The order of construction is slightly different.

1. Measure your pillow. Mine is 40x40 cm, so I will use that as an example. To cover the entire pillow I will need two pieces of the same size, but instead of cutting two and have more sewing I will cut one piece 40x80 cm in size. 
2. Place the zipper to the right side of the short edge of the pillowcase and sew together. Repeat for the other side. 
3. Now that the pillowcase looks like a tube as the zipper is attached, keep it right sides together and open the zipper slightly. Otherwise you will not be able to turn the pillowcase once done. Sew the side seams from the zipper to the folded edge. Then turn right sides out, insert the pillow and close the zipper.

METHOD 3 (advanced)

This method creates a professional looking pillowcase but requires a bit more cutting and planning. It uses zipper hidden under a placket on the back side of the pillowcase and is constructed from three pieces of fabric: the front and a split back.

The pieces for method 3 construction, and diagram of the joining of back pieces, zipper and overlapping knife pleat.

1. Measure your pillow: Mine is 40x40 cm. That is the size of your front piece. For the back piece I want to place my zipper about 5-10 cm down from the top edge - let us for arguments sake say that I place it 8 cm down from the top edge. For the larger, bottom piece I will simply remove the topmost 8 centimeters and ass 1 cm seam allowance. My bottom back piece will thus measure 33x40 cm. I want the top piece to overlap the zipper with a couple of centimeters. So for the tops piece, which is 8 cm I will add 5 cm for the overlap (which will be folded double) and add 1 cam for seam allowance. In total: 14,5x40 cm.
2. Sew the zipper to the top edge of the back bottom piece, right sides together. 
3. Sew the zipper to the bottom of the back top piece, right sides together.
4. Fold the top back piece over the zipper, creating a knife pleat that covers it. Sew down this pleat to keep it in place.
5. Open the zipper slightly, and sew the front and back pieces together, right sides together. 
6. Clip the corners and turn right side out. Insert pillow and close the zipper.

I hope you have enjoyed this tutorial.

~Stella

DIY: Cute ragdoll-dress for summer

A few years back I used to work at a fabric store. As a result I still have boxes upon boxes filled with fabric. Last Autumn I went through my whole stash and reorganized everything into neat piles and put them in clear boxes so I could see everything. Since then my fabric stash has been a bit more manageable.

I have vowed to not by new fabric until my stash is greatly diminished, so in order to do that I try to sew every now and again. Since I am also slowly creating a new wardrobe this goes hand in hand with the sewing. Problem is I usually need a lot of time and very good inspiration in order to sew. Pattern creation and new garments take a lot of time.

So last Monday inspiration hit and I happened to have extra time on my hands. Thus I went through my stash in search of fabrics that might match. I wanted to make a lace dress, but I did not have enough lace to make both the top and bottom parts of a full circle skirt dress. So I chose a black chiffon with a floral pattern for the skirt part and a lace for the top and sleeves. For lining I found a viscose with a very nice feel to it and a good weight. So I started cutting out pattern pieces, playing tetris with the pattern to get all the pieces out of my half meter lace fabric.

Top pieces cut.

Once I had everything cut I started with the lining of the skirt. I serged the hem and added a 25cm wide lace to it, ruffling it slightly. I then hemmed the edge of the chiffon but ran into some trouble with my serger. Frustrated and a bit tired already, I decided to cover the hem of the chiffon up with a red velvet ribbon. Some years ago I bought 15 meters of this ribbon and I thought I could finally put at least some of it to good use.

Once the skirt part was done I got started with the top. With both the lace and the lining I started by joining the shoulder seams together. I then attached the unlined sleeves and sandwiched them between the lining and the lace. I had to undo the seams and put them back together again because I was tired and wasn't paying attention to which way I was fastening them, but a frustrating 45 minutes later I was back on track.

Once the sleeves were attached I started thinking about how to hem them. I looked through my lace ribbon stash and found some stretchy, not so wide lace and decided to hem the sleeves with that to give them a neater look. I finished the head opening of the dress in the same fashion.

Hemming the sleeves.

The last thing that remained was to attach the top to the skirt layers. I serged them together and put in a line of strengthening straight stitches. I then zig-zagged an elastic band to this waistline to make the skirt fit nicely and not just hang like a sack from my shoulders. And here is the finished dress:

In all these are the materials I used:

1,2 m chiffon
1,5 m viscose (lining)
0,5 m lace fabric
6 m of 25 cm wide lace (lining hem)
5 m red velvet ribbon
1,7 m stretch lace (sleeves, head opening)
1 m of 0,7 mm wide elastic
black and red sewing thread.

Time: I think it took me about 8 hours from start to finish, including pattern drafting, meal breaks, chatting with friends and going for a walk in between. Had I worked non-stop I could probably have halved the time.

The dress fits nicely and the viscose works really well as a lining fro this dress. In all it feels light to wear, it is super cute and the uneven hem hives it a slightly rag-doll feel. Hmm. I wonder what I should make next.

~Stella