iPhone cover tutorial

Hi Everyone,

During our quarantine period I designed and made this:


It is the snug little home that protects The Precious (my iPhone). I promised a tutorial and finally - here it is.

Cut a 12.5" x 3.5" piece of fabric for the outer (this is the fabric with the coquettish kittens) and a piece of wadding (I used cotton) and a piece of lining fabric slightly larger than the outer.

Make a sandwich with the wrong side of the lining fabric facing towards you, then place the wadding on top of it and finally the fabric for the outer on top of that right side towards you. Now pin it all together ready to quilt it.

Using your walking foot, quilt the sandwich using whatever design you prefer. I just did straight vertical lines lining my walking foot up with the edge of the fabric for the first row and then with the stitching for each subsequent row.

Photo of quilting.

When the quilting is finished it will look like this. You now need to trim the excess lining fabric and wadding off with your rotary cutter until it looks like this:




Neatly trimmed unit (how cute are those cats?)

Turn your piece of quilted fabric over so the liner is towards you and using a circle template (I used a ramekin - but anything circular will do) draw a semi-circle around the top inside edge of your fabric. Take care when determining which end is the top - this is especially important if you are using a directional print like I did (I found this out the hard way - to my shame there was some swearing). Then, with your scissors trim around this line.


Now it's time to add the velcro. I used sticky velcro dots. Place one on the lining fabric - the centre of the dot should be 3/4" from the top edge. The centre of the other dot should in the middle of the outer fabric 1 1/4" from the top edge.

Sew the dots in place - they will not adhere to the fabric (take it from one who found out the hard way)

Now for the binding,

Cut one 3 3/4" x 1 1/4" strip of fabric. Iron both ends in a 1/4" as shown in the photo above. Then iron the strip in half and then iron the raw edges in towards the centre press mark. It should now look like the photo below.


Note the snazzy new ironing board cover! I couldn't live with the shame of the old over-loved one anymore and had to make an emergency trip to BigW to replace it.




Place the binding as indicated in the photo above and using a co-ordinating thread stitch in place. I like to put my stitches as close to the edge of the binding as possible . (It's not clear from the photos, but of course you need to stretch your quilted fabric out into a long strip for this step or your opening to the iPhone cover would be stitched shut - hopefully the photo below showing the first cover I made will clarify this)




Next, with the right side of the lining facing you fold the straight bottom edge up 5" towards the top as illustrated in the photo above.


Using a 1/4" seam stitch both sides of the cover down as illustrated above.



Next construct a binding in exactly the same way as you did earlier, but this time it should measure 17" x 1 1/4". Keep one half of the binding folded over and pin this half in place as shown in the photo and carefully sew it in place using a matching thread. Take care with the pinning - you may need to ease in some of the fullness of the binding around the curved edges. I hope that the following photos make this process all clear.


Sewing the binding down.Your binding should now look like this on the back of the iPhone cover.

The front will look like this.

Secure the front of the binding with binding clips or pins.

Hand-stitch your binding in place.


Now all that is left to do is sew on a cute decorative button if you feel so inclined, insert your iPhone and enjoy. This pattern could easily be adapted for other devices like blackberries or even for a pencil case or sunglasses case.

I hope you have enjoyed this tutorial - don't hesitate to contact me if you have any questions. Also, if you do make one I'd love to see a photo of your finished product and finally if you do make one feel free to sell it - go forth and craft with impunity!

Until next time,

Shontelle

Tutorial Time

Hi Everyone,

This week all of my dreams came true when my husband asked me...... to teach him how to sew. Yes ladies, I have finally lured him over to the dark side. He wanted to make a bag for his D&D dice (that's Dungeons and Dragons for the uninitiated - now all of his secrets are coming out) and so together we nutted out a design and I showed him the ropes.

Here he is in action:

Doesn't it just make you weak at the knees? We had a little excursion to Spotlight where he chose some fabric and thread then he got stuck into it. Between us, I think he is addicted - he has already made 4 bags and as I type I can hear the Janome humming away in the kitchen.

Here are the bags he has made so far:



I think that besides being an excellent recepticle for D&D dice they would be an ideal bag for make-up, sewing notions, jewellry - anything really. So I thought I would put together a tutorial for you on how to make one.

Here is the finished product:


And here is how you get there:


Cut two pieces of fabric 8.5" x 14.5" (we used cotton drill in ours to give the bag body)

Then fold both pieces of fabric in half lengthways right sides together and sew up the sides with a 1/4" seam allowance.

Leave a gap of about 1.5" roughly 2.5" from the bottom of one of the sides of the lining reinforcing the stitches either side of the gap.


Now, line up the 2" marks of your ruler with the side seam and the base of the bag as shown above and draw a line around it. Do this on both bottom corners, on both sides of the fabric. Repeat these steps on your liner.


The photo above shows the drawn lines on the base.


Make a fold in the bag at the corners of the lines you have drawn in (this is a bit tricky to explain, but I hope that the photos below will make it clearer)

The corner of your bag should now look like this.



Next you need to sew along the chalk line on both corners of the liner and the outer.


Line up the 1/4" mark of your ruler with the seam you have sewn and trim off the corner. Repeat this step for both sides of the outer and liner.


Turn your liner inside out so that when you look into the bag you can see the seams and place it inside the outer. The right sides of the fabric should face each other. Find the centre of one side of the bag and place a pin about 1/4" either side of the centre point. This is where your drawstring will eventually be thread through. You will see from the picture above that I used yellow pins to mark these points and blue everywhere else so that I didn't get confused.


Now starting at a yellow pin, sew a 1/4" seam around the top of the bag remembering to reinforce the start and finish points with a reverse stitch.

Your bag should now look like this.



Turn your bag right side out through the little opening you left earlier in the lining. Mark your drawstring opening with a couple of pins and stitch a seam about 1/8th of an inch from the top.

Again, start your seam at one of the yellow pins and reverse at the beginning and end points for strength.


Repeat this step by sewing another seam about 3/8ths of an inch below the top seam. Take care to maintain the opening for the drawstring and remember to reverse stitch at the start and end of the row of stitching. (I'm sorry I forgot to take a photo of this step but you can see the seam in the photo below).

Now for your final row of stitching. This time start the stitching in one of the side seams and simply sew a continuous line until you reach your starting point and neatly reverse to secure the stitches. This row is about 1/2" from the one above it and completes the channel that the drawstring will run through.

Handstitch the opening in the lining closed.

Cut a 25" piece of nylon cord and thread it through the top opening of the bag and then through the drawstring channel.


Now, just thread the drawstring through a cord puller and you are done. A cute little dilly bag for your D&D dice or whatever else takes your fancy.

I hope that you have enjoyed this tutorial. I would love it if you sent me a picture if you make one and feel free to contact me for clarification of the instuctions.

Until next time,

Shontelle

Wouldn't you love to win this?

Hi Everyone,

I thought I'd post some photos of what Mum has been furiously working on for the past couple of weeks. For those of you that don't know, Mum is a professional machine quilter and this year she was asked to quilt the raffle quilt for the South Australian Quilters' Guild. She has pulled out all the stops and done a marvellous job.

The whole quilt


Centre detail

Close up of centre



Border detail


How perfect is that stitching around the applique and the cross hatching?



Can this woman work a ruler or what?




Rays


Detail of the setting block - what a cute motif


And finally piano keys in the borders.

The quilt will be on display at various venues including The Festival of Quilts in November and all money raised will go to Autism SA.

Well done, Mum - you should be very proud of yourself.

Until next time,

Shontelle.