Sometimes, the smallest projects bring the greatest joy. My latest finish is a small zipper pouch. A quick but meaningful make, infused with slow stitching, beautiful threads, and a gentle reminder of wellness.
In this post, I am going to share with you a sewing tutorial for simple, super cute, sweet Pencil Pouch with a bow on it!
Perfect gifts for girls. Handmade with love from you and so sweet with endless option of colours of course! Of course, you can always skip the bow, and make it in band instead for the boys!
(Click on Pin it button on the top left of the photo to pin it for future project!)
Step by step sewing tutorial for zippered pencil pouch
There are affiliate links within this post for your convenience. Please find my full disclosure here.
Material requirements:
- Exterior : 2 pieces of 5 x 9″ – I used
with
for extra sturdy
- Lining : 2 pieces of 5 x 9″ – printed cotton
If you are looking for fabrics, I would love to recommend online shopping HERE> I love their customer service, cheap capped international shipping (since I am an international) and their fabric bundle comes in such a beautiful package.
(for all four of the above pieces, cut round /curve both bottom corners as in the photo. (you can use a coin to trace first). Make sure all corners are same.Then cut a slit about 1.5″ at the middle of the curve – this will be darts. See photo for a better idea.
- Inside batting: 2 pieces: 4.25″ x 9″ – for shape and soft feel of the pencil pouch – I use
, or you can use
for a more sturdier form.
- Bow : 8 x 3″ piece – for bow + 3.5 x3 batting for shape and 1.5 x 4″ for the middle band
- Bow strip : 2.25 x 10″ – cotton colour matching with bow
- zipper ends: 2 pieces of 2.5 x 2″
- >
Sewing Instructions
- Fold the top edge of the exterior pieces about 0.25″ and place the batting in place, matching bottom corners. You can you basting spray or just school glue and iron them so that they stick if you find them fiddly to work with.
- Sew darts on all 4 piece of the main body except the front exterior. We are going to make the embellishment first. Start by making the strip – fold inside the seams and place onto the exterior piece about 1.5″ from the bottom. Top stitch to place.
- Handstitch the middle together in a nice even scrunch forming a bow shape.
- Fold a band of fabric so that the seam is inside. Fold one half bigger than the other so that both seams are hidden when folded again. See the first two photos below.
- Then wrap around your bow and stitch close to form a ring. Don’t mind the seams – this will later be hidden under the bow.
- Turn and top stitch closing the opening gap and all around.
- Make the bow by folding the 8 x 3″ piece right sides together in half (horizontally) and placing a batting on either side. Sew the edges and leave a gap for turning.
- Place the bow in place and hand stitch with a whip stitch in place. Pull the thread nicely to make sure the stitches are not that visible.
- You can choose to embroider the name for more personalization. I use free motion technique to embroider mine
- Trim the zipper to 8″ total in length. Cover the ends with the 2.5x 2 ” fabric as shown in the photos below.
- Place the zipper edge onto one of the lining edge leaving a 0.5″ space at each right and left sides. Place the folded top edge of the exterior on top of zipper close to its teeth as in photo 1 below.
- Top stitch using a
.
- Sew the dart for the exterior piece
- Fold the lining in place and press with an iron
- Do the same for the other side.
- Putting right sides together, lining facing lining, exterior facing exterior -sew around the edges and leave an opening gap on the lining side.
- Trim close to the sewn line around the zipper are -this will reduce bulk when turning making it look neat
- Turn right side out and press.
VOILA!
I hope you enjoy the tutorial! Tag me on my Instagram or add it to my Flickr pool if you make any.
Here are some more I’ve made. It was such a fun little project!
For more tutorial click here.
Pin this for future reference!
I have been making more of my Girlfriend’s Wallet and this time round I use pastel colors as these are custom orders.
I realized I didn’t have much pastel fabrics in my stash. I am not into much pastel but I still love them. Maybe it is a new beginning to start a pastel stash!
Anyway, this time I reprinted my Girlfriend’s wallet pattern and found the watermark was just covering some of the words, so I decided to remove the watermark, added some minor changes to measurement of the card pocket for more room for adjusting your card slots. It still works if you decide to use the old version of the pattern, as this is just a minor change to allow more room for errors.
I was feeling really organized and had all my cut pieces labelled as per instruction. The fun alphabetical printout makes it so much fun and cute!
I made two of the wallet. Easier to go through the process all at once. Makes production much faster too!
I added clasp at the side of the wallet. This clasp can be used to hold on to keys or even to slide in a wrislet. Perfect for a short stroll without handbag. Everything in one place!
Here is a short tutorial on how to make the clasp:
Just before the step of sewing down the interior piece with the exterior,
1. Cut a piece of 2.5″ square from the fabric you want to make the clasp holder with. Iron on the light interfacing.
2. Fold the horizontal side seam inside about 0.5″ in like the second photo below.
3. Fold it again in half, folded edges meeting each other. Top stitch close to each side.
4. Slide in the clasp through the sewn piece and pin in place. Continue to sewing the exterior to interior piece together as per instruction in the pattern.
I hope that helps!
Have fun making your wallet.
GIRLFRIEND’S WALLET
Hi!
Just to share my latest addition to our handmade life. “The lunch bag”. I love lunch bags. So practical and funny how much fun it can bring to lunch hours at school.
I made these two lunch bags last two weekends but I have just got the time to blog, so some may have already seen it popped in my Instagram a week back.
Anyway, one is for my DH and one for me. I took the inspiration spring to make mine as it is gorgeously spring here down under when I made these.
They are still prototype. I still don’t like a few things about them. Well for one, I think the closure could be better. Maybe not a fixed button instead a tie or something. I need to figure what could be best. Any ideas? Am planning to do a tutorial for these bags but have to figure out how to make the closure better. I don’t feel like this button closure is practical enough.
The lunch bag resemble the brown paper bag. I purposely make it like that. I love that it can open wide, fits a wide lunch box or bento box. However, I think a handle wouldn’t hurt.. it should make the bag easy to carry. Well, we’ll see.
I will try and put together a tutorial soon, so if you have and idea of how to make a closure for this bag, do drop your comment, I’d love to hear it!
Till then,
Have a lovely week!
In this post, I am sharing with you, a sewing tutorial on how to make a simple tote. A tote with an exterior made of selvedges. Throwing out bits of fabrics has always been hard for me. Even the littlest or the tiniest let alone the selvedges, long strips of fun text with a bit of the fabric itself. Some have really cute colour codes which make it even harder to throw out. So I decided to keep them, hoping some day I will get to use them in a string quilt like this,this or this.
But in the meantime, I just like to see them used in a simple quick project. So I made a tote out of some of them.
I have them in different sizes, mainly because they are left overs and sometime I need to use the fabric as much as near the edge but I still keep the selvedge because of the texts.
Here is the sewing tutorial for the selvedge tote, so you can go make one too!
Sewing Tutorial for Tote Bag using Selvedges
There are affiliate links in this post for your convenience. Please find my full disclosure here.
You can make any size you want, but here I will give out the size I use for mine.
Material Requirements:
- A pile of selvedges. It will be easier to have long ones, longer than the width of the tote. Otherwise, you may patch them beforehand to make them long enough.
or use this
, slightly larger than the size of your tote (I use 2 pieces of 15 x 18″)
- half yard of lining fabric
- a fat quarter for the interior pocket
- a pair of straps, (I use an old overall straps for mine)
- you can also make one using 4 strips of 2 x 40″ fabric – place two strip right sides together, sew all around leaving a 3″ gap for turning right side, Turn right side out, press and top sticth all around the sides. Make a pair.
- or you can simply use this
- or you can also use premade leather
Piecing Instructions
1.First, you will need to piece and quilt as you go the exterior pieces. Sew the selvedges onto the batting covering the raw edges with the neighboring non-fraying edge.
2. If the selvedge finish edge is one of those fray finish, you may put the selvedge right side together and sew rough edges together and flip open.
3. Continue until the batting is filled. Do the same for the other piece.
4. Trim the piece to size, 14″ x17″ with a curvy bottom corners
5. Cut the same 2 piece for the lining from the lining fabrics
6. Remove about a 1/4″ of batting from the top side of the piece. I like to do this to avoid bulk later on when sewing the top side.
7. Cut out 15 x 10″ out of the pocket fabric. Fold in half with right sides facing, so that it now measures 7.5 x 10″. Sew all the way around and leave a small opening for turning right side out. Press and top stitch the edges.
8. Place onto one of the lining piece. Center it out. I put mine about 7″ away the top edge. Sew onto the lining piece on the 3 sides leaving the top side open so that this will become the pocket. You can also stitch the middle down, so that you can have two smaller pocket instead.
9. Place the strap 3″ away from the sides, and the end of the strap should be 7″ from the top. Mark a line 1 1/2″ and 2 1/2″ away from the top.(I use to do this as in the photo). This is where I make the square with an X.
10. Pin and sew the strap onto the exterior piece.
11. Place the two lining piece right side together and sew the sides and the bottom leaving the top side open. Turn right side out. Clip the corners carefully not to snip the stitches
12. Place the exterior piece right sides together and sew the sides and the base leaving the top side open.
13. Now place the lining piece inside the exterior piece right sides together. make sure the straps is put inside too.
14. Pin and sew the top edge, leaving a gap for turning right side out.
15. Turn right side out. Press well and top stitch the top seam, closing the gap as you go. Press well.
It’s done. Enjoy!
Hope you enjoy the tutorial! Make sure you pin it to your pinterest board!
Hi!
I had an amazing sale for the Girlfriend’s wallet last week, and I thank you each of you who have bought the pattern and support my endevour in pattern making. I wish all of you will try and make the wallet as it is soooo much fun!
Me and my sister spent most of our week together making the handmade wallets in different fabrics. Liberty included. I really love wallet making. So satisfying.
You can purchase the pattern HERE.
The pattern includes 50+ photos to guide you through the wallet making process. You can even grab some more tips over on instagram with #girlfriendswalletsewalong or scroll down my instagram profile.
You can make the wallet with a scrappy quilted look too. It is up to you. Let your imagination fly. Share with me your finish work too. I would really love to see them!
Linking up to finish it up friday and link a finish friday
XOXO
Hi!
Finally, after having wonderful testers out there, I am able to release my Girlfriend’s Wallet pattern! It is now available on Craftsy and HERE I am very happy with it and hopefully, it will be useful for all of you who would like to make your own handmade wallets.
You can click the following link :
This pattern includes 16 pages with 50 clear photos with written instructions to guide you through the making process. I have many wallets before, and I find the way I make this wallet turns out to be the best so far and produces a very professional looking wallet. Even more, you can make it in your favorite fabric or even make a quilted version. I love mine!
So, why wait? Go and make your handmade wallet today! Am sure it will catch those eyes at the cashier.
Thank you to all of my testers, they were all wonderful and has given a lot of feedback that helped made the pattern better. Here are their versions.
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Right side from top to bottom made by : Rose, Vicki, Kirsten. Left side : Daryl and Amy |
Thank you to all my testers, to all who did volunteere too! Sorry I couldn’t pick all of you. You all have been a wonderful supporter and really do appreciate all of you who have come to visit me here in my littlemushroomcap.