Pouch for iPad Mini

Added buttons and Velcro and made my iPad mini pouch as a stand.
Comes in two angles - one for typing and one for viewing.

If you have a soft iPad mini sleeve like mine, turn it into a stand just like this..
all material used can be bought from Daiso. However, I don't think the same can work for iPad, it might be too heavy..


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Tutorial: Multipurpose Pouch

I have received quite a number of enquiries and orders for this multipurpose pouch which I have done for the craft fair. I thought some of you might be interested in the making of it.. so I gathered some photos I took while making it and compiled it into a.. tutorial.. actually I would not want to call it a tutorial because I feel that it is not very well documented. Nevertheless it shows the process of making and it is not very difficult, so hopefully by looking at the photos you will get the idea how it can be done and maybe can try sewing one by yourself :)

So this is it, the finished product. The sewing pattern is inspired by a stationery pouch by Xiao Bai, a super talented handmade artist from Taiwan, she's my idol in sewing pouches!

First of course you pick the fabrics that you like and will go well with each other.

Then, cut the fabric! The white colour stuff is called.. stabilizer/fleece/interfacing.. I am still not very sure about the name >.< but anyway it is super important and I use it in all my handmade projects. It comes in different thickness and one adhesive side which can be ironed on to your fabric. This wonderful product will raise the finished quality level of your work to look very crisp and professional. Can be found in Spotlight!

Here are the measurements for different components inside the pouch. For the smaller cuts of fabrics you can just cut the fleece same size as the fabric. For the card holder we actually need 3 pieces of fabrics and 2 pieces of fleece, all of the same size. 

Pen/pencil holder, you do not need a fleece for this because you will need to sew them into folds later and it will be very difficult to work with if the whole thing is too thick.

 Iron the fleece onto the fabric. Immediately the fabric will look very smooth and crisp.

 Other things you might need to add in the details in the finishing product..

 Fix the button and you can leave this outer fabric aside first.

Making the middle pocket. On the left is the cover, right side is the bottom pocket. The cover will protect the things from dropping out from the pocket in case you hold the pouch upside down.

 Finished piece of card holder.

Finished piece of pen holder. Basically for all these small pockets you just need to sew 3/4 round of it and turn it inside out.

Fix everything in place and place the outer fabric on top (wrong side facing you) then sew around it. I will usually sew 1cm away from the edge of the fabric. Leave a small opening and turn the whole piece inside out. Later you can use mattress stitch to close the opening.. and.. it's done!

I love making this because it only requires very basic sewing techniques. You just need to cut to the right size and place everything at the right position. I hope this can give you the idea of how the pouch is being made and perhaps inspire some of you to try sewing it yourself :) I know my instructions given here are not very clear, because I did not intend to do a tutorial on this while I was documenting the process. If you have any questions can email me and let me know :)

Curious Doodle

I have been a fan of this website ever since the first time I visit there, Curious Doodle. It is a great place for crafting inspirations.

Sewing on paper is not something new, I have done that for my A level coursework 4 years ago, I even did sewing on acrylic, sewing on cement blocks, lol.. but.. at curious doodle, she manage to pack everything nicely and make them into kits so that anyone who purchase it can experience the fun of sewing! Plus, I believe it's her background in design, all her graphics for sewing are very nice! I'm sure you will get a great deal of satisfaction upon completion of any of her projects :)

Go explore and see it for yourself!
http://www.curiousdoodles.blogspot.sg/

Handmade Brush Holder and the Process of Making!

Ta-dah! Upon the request of my boss at the children's art studio, I am finally done with this brush holder! I am so happy what i thought actually worked so I am going to share with you the process of making. 

[Note: it's a process of making and not a tutorial because this is the very first time I am making a brush holder, there's no measurement or pattern to follow, and most of the time I don't really know what's going to happen next. It's more like a exploration and making something new. So it will be a huge disappointment if I say it's a tutorial as I don't really have the steps ready >.<]

Well anyway! Let's start from the selection of cloth, I have chosen the oil cloth because it is waterproof and as the name says it's a brush holder, often kids have to keep their brushes before they can fully dry them. So it only makes sense to me that you have a waterproof one if not the holder will get wet. Sadly, these are all the oilcloth I have :/ so the color and pattern combination is a bit weird but it gets better after a while. Haha.

So, the materials you need. Pretty simple, cloth, hard cardboard, scissors, double sided tape, the 'handmade' stamp that I always like to put on my projects, velcro, ruler... of coz it includes other things like pencil, pen knife, sewing machine, thread and needle..

You start by dividing the hard cardboard into four equal parts and a good ruler and a sharp pen knife will make your life A LOT EASIER!! I love the ruler from Martha Steward, it makes drawing straight line, right angles, perpendicular lines so much easier and more accurate.

Then you cut the cloth based on the parameter of the 4 rectangles, leaving enough space for sewing.

The hippo cloth will be the back, green polka dot is inside, plain canvas cloth is first layer of the holder and blue polka dot is the second layer. The rough measurements are : 49cm x 38cm for hippo and green polka dot, 49cm x 15cm for canvas, 49cm x 19cm for blue polka dot. Actually you can do any size you like, based on the cardboard size you choose.

Then you arrange the cloth in sequence and you can sew the sides of green polka dot, canvas and blue polka dot. This is to secure the different layers so that it is easier to sew the pockets later.

This is how I sew the pockets. Because it is really difficult to draw on oilcloth and I do not want to dirty the cloth so I actually pasted a sheet of layout pad on it and I draw the lines on the layout pad, it's easy to see therefore easy to sew later. I use layout pad a lot for my graphic design class, it is a very light weight paper which is only 45g/m^2 (normal printing paper is about 80g). So it's very easy to tear off after you sew and it does not harm the sewing machine, haha. But I guess there is a specific kind of paper made for this purpose but oh well..

Very easy to tear off..

Time to add the hippo cloth in.

Pin them together and sew around it, leaving the bottom open to insert the cardboards.

Trim the sides so when you turn inside out you won't get bulky edges.

Ta-dah, it's almost done! Remember to add in the velcro scraps.

At this stage it's already a functional roll-up pencil case, but we are making a stand so there's more to it.

Insert the cardboard and align to the sides and corners. I used double-sided tape to stick them down as well.

You can machine stitch the bottom closure but I want to hide the seams so I did hand stitch and OMG oilcloth is superrrrrrrr hard to sew -.-

Stitch together like this... and...

PULL! (make sure your thread is strong, if not you pull and it will break)

So.. it's done!

2 layers so you can put more brushes :)

Anyway, this is my new iphone cover with the small cat lying there.. all for 9 bucks!! hohoho..

Thanks for reading and have a nice day :)