FREE E-BOOK! Teach your kids to sew with a pair of jeans

 

I have now made the second of my sewing e-books available for free download!

'Teach your kids to sew with a pair of jeans'

I made a YouTube video explaining a little about what the book contains and showing the items you can make using the tutorials contained within.

To read more about my e-book, click here.

The link to download the book is also on that page.

I've decided to make this e-book available for free-download to try to encourage as many kids (or adults) as possible to use what they've got and learn a new skill.

I encourage you to download this e-book and have a try at sewing any or all of the tutorials within. My kids had a lot of fun learning, and made some fun and useful things along the way.

I'd love if you shared this post, or the YouTube video and help get this e-book out there and as help as many people as possible to learn, teach and encourage others to sew - especially kids!

It is so empowering to make something for yourself. I have tried to make the tutorials as clear and simple as possible with lots of photos.

So click here to read more about this FREE e-book and to download a copy for yourself!

Thanks for your support!

Plastic Lid Lamp Upcycle (a tutorial) - Day 72, Use What You've Got

The school holidays started yesterday and we started as we mean to go on - with a craft that involves, 

Using What We've Got!

I've had this old lamp in the cupboard for a while. the light itself works, just the shade disintegrated and had to be thrown out.

My daughter has also been collecting plastic lids from the milk and juice bottles for a while now - saving them for some kind of crafty endeavour.

First we had to find a way to hold the upper shade ring up to create a frame for the shade.  I had some old pieces of wood from a broken tray and we got out my hot glue gun to stick it all together.

Once we had the frame, we used some fishing wire, and the plastic lids to create the lampshade.

We used an awl to punch holes on 2 sides of each lid.

Then tied the fishing wire to the bottom of the frame, before threading it through one hole at a time to secure each lid in place all the way up to the top of the frame, where we wrapped the wire around the top, down to the bottom and up ready to start the next column of coloured lids.

We worked our way around the frame - one of us on either side, until we met.

Then after tying the loose ends of fishing wire off, we got the glue gun out again to hold the lids together and all facing the right way.

Once the glue had dried we could trim the wire and pull off the stringy glue bits.

Then test it out inside..

My daughter is very happy with her new lamp. Especially since she was so involved in making it.

And we made it just with things we had on hand!

What do you think? 

Have you ever upcycled a lamp?

Or made something with plastic lids? We still have plenty of lids left over and are looking for the next craft!

Notebook covers - another school dress upcycle - Day 31 - Use What You've Got

Upcycling more of my girls old school dresses yesterday. 

I made them a couple of notebook covers. These covers slip over a regular exercise book measuring about 22.5 x 17.5cm (9 x 7")

The simple 5 steps in 15 minutes tutorial for making these notebook covers is here.

For the covers I made yesterday I used fabric from the dresses for the outside, and co-ordinating fabric for the inside. I also added each of my girls initials on the outside of the covers using the co-ordinating fabric, just to make them a little more special!

And I still have some more of the dresses to use up - so come back tomorrow again to see what else I've made by upcycling these dresses!

Mini Triangular Boxes

I found these cute little triangular pouches via Pinterest a while ago and pinned them to my Things I want to make board.

I had just a little time yesterday for sewing so was looking for a quic kproject and these fit the bill perfectly.

The tutorial is by Needling Things and she made these pouches as thread catchers.

It's a great little tutorial, and is basically a kind of fabric origami bag as you just make a double sided triangle using two pieces of fabric, then fold and stitch the edges together before adding the buttons. Nice and easy!

I made one using  left over scraps from sundresses.

I actually used this same combination of fabrics when I made another fabric origami bag a while ago:

I also made another triangular box with my cute cat fabric, and a scrap of plain red.

They are such cute little boxes that could be used for all sorts of things..

I'm going to give these two boxes to my daughters who I'm sure have lots of little trinkets that they can fill them with!!

What would you use boxes like this for?

Make your own apron in 5 steps and 15 minutes

My daughter needed a new apron for cooking. She'd grown out of her last one - and since both my girls seem to be growing fast I wanted to make something basic and simple, because no doubt they will grow again soon!

So here's how to make a basic apron in just 5 steps and 15 minutes.

You will need:

Fabric - 1 yard is ample.

Thread and sewing machine.

Step 1.

Cut the fabric

First you need to measure the person whom you are making the apron for.

Measure.. the following:

A: From the collar down to knees (length of the apron)

B: Around the hips from side to side (width of the apron)

C: Inside arm to inside arm (width of top of apron)

D: From collar to waist (from top of apron to straps)

For the straps - use your tape measure to find a comfortable length around the neck - by lifting the tape over the head.

The straps should both be around 4 cm (1.5") longer than the width of the apron.

For my 10 year old daughter, I cut:

Main piece - 42 x 64 cm (16.5 x 25")

Neck strap - 52 x 10 cm (20.5 x 4")

2 Waist straps - 46 x 10 cm (18 x 4")

Step 2

Cut main apron shape.

Fold your main fabric in half then measure in from the fold at the top HALF of measurement C (for me this was 11.5 cm (4.5"))

Place a pin here.

Then measure down from the top edge of the longer side of the fabric - on the open edges, measurement D (for me this was 27cm (10.5")).

Place another pin here.

Then cut through both layers of fabric in a curved shape from pin to pin:

Step 3

Finish off the edges of the main apron piece.

Simple double turn over the edge of the apron piece to hide the raw edges and stitch all the way around like this:

Step 4

The straps

For each strap: 

1.fold the short edge over

2. Fold both long sides in to the middle

3. Fold one side over the other to completely hide the raw edges.

4. Top-Stitch around all 4 edges, remembering to turn in the other short end to hide that raw edge.

Step 5

Attach the straps to the main apron.

Place the apron flat, and pin the 2 straps and the longer neck strap to the back corners of the apron like this:

Stitch each strap into place securely by stitch a square with a cross through the middle where it joins to the main apron.

All done! Try your apron on and set to work in the kitchen!

For the downloadable PDF version of this tutorial, click here.

To see more tutorials for useful things to make in just 

5 steps and 15 minutes - go here.

Or you can visit my tutorials page for over 

100 free sewing tutorials for all sewing levels!

Komebukuro - Traditional Japanese Rice Bag - a tutorial

A Komebukuro is a Japanese cotton drawstring bag that was used to carry offerings of rice to Japanese temples or shrines. The word literally means rice (Kome) - bag (bukuro).

I have some Japanese fabrics in my stash and thought this would be a great project to use some of them:

Here's how to make your own:

You will need:

Fabrics of your choice. I used denim for the base square, and two different cottons for the main bag parts.

Cord for drawstring.

Cut 10 squares of fabric the same size, 

2 for the base, 

4 for the outer bag  

4 for the lining

1. Lay out your squares as you want your bag to look with the base piece in the centre and the sides around each edge like this:

2. Pin, then stitch each piece to the base, right sides together:

3. Next you need to stitch each side together.

 (Again right sides of the fabric facing each other.)

Turn right side out and now you have a small boxy bag:

4. Repeat Steps 1-3 with your remaining squares. This will make the lining of your bag.

5. Place one bag inside the other like this:

Then fold the both the outer and inner bag tops inwards to hide the raw edges:

6. Pin then top-stitch all the way around the top:

7. On each side of the bag near the top - mark with pins where you want the drawstring to go through.  If you like you can measure and place these perfectly evenly, but I just eye-balled it.

8. Stitch 2 buttonholes in each side near the top where you have pinned. Then thread the cord in and out around the top of the bag through the buttonholes.

9. To hide the ends of the cord drawstring, take a scrap of one of your fabrics and fold it in half, right sides together; then stitch down both sides.

10. Turn right sides out and push in the ends of the cord into the little pocket you just made.

11. Tuck the raw edges inside the pocket, then stitch carefully across the top to secure.

12. Your Komebukuro is now finished!

You can choose different fabrics for the outside and inside as the bag is reversible!

And you can make these bags any size you like simply by changing the size of the squares you cut!

And you can fill them with whatever you choose! It doesn't have to be rice!!

 For the downloadable PDF version of this tutorial, click here.

And for lots more of my free sewing tutorials take a look at 

My Tutorials Page