Teaching Practice: Mini iPad Carrier

My two sons, one 7 and one 5, have now become interested in sewing after watching me giving some sewing lessons last week. My oldest, Connor, has not wanted to really follow through except to request more made to order items and go fabric shopping for his stuff.  My youngest, Aidan, pretty much begged me to teach him about the basics of sewing.

I thought for a while about what project to give him where he would not lose interest and could help at the sewing machine.  My boys both received iPad mini's for Christmas and have the most amazing foam cases that are very protective but also very large.  So I thought an over the shoulder carry case might make traveling with his iPad nicer.

I had some errands to run and we stopped at Hancock Fabrics armed with coupons and Aidan selected all of his own fabrics, a faux fur for the interior and a polar fleece for the exterior.  He also selected some wide polyester webbing in a fantastic rainbow color scheme.  He is a very outgoing child and I honestly could not influence him on his choices.  We actually had a little tisk at the store because he found an organza print he wanted very badly but I had to explain it would be a poor choice for a case and he finally caved in and agreed to look at heavier weight fabrics.  He also selected some happy face buttons to add as trim.

To make the case, we measured the iPad in its case and added 2 inches to width and length to account for the depth of the case and to make it easier for him to insert and remove the iPad.  Using the fold of the fabric as the bottom, I cut a rectangle piece in both fabrics.  The faux fur became the interior lining while the polar fleece became the exterior.

After cutting the pieces, I pinned them right sides together and sat my son at the machine.  Using a half inch seam allowance, I held the fabric and his hands and he pushed the pedal very slowly.  He was so excited that he was actually using the machine!  We had a lot of fun sewing the four straight seams.

After we had two fully sewn pouches, I took over on the sewing and Aidan helped do some pinning.  First, I measured the webbing length and tacked to the right side of the lining.  Since we needed to use his button somehow, I used the last of the webbing as a flip closure.  We worked on attaching the lining to the exterior, I did the sewing on that one.  We flipped it right side out and top stitched the opening all around for extra security.  Aidan helped to hand sew the buttons and the case was complete.

Aidan has been using his new carry case for a week now and it is holding up nicely.  He proudly tells people, whether they wanted to know or not, that it was his design and he helped to make.  It makes me very proud and happy to his face when people complement him on his good work.

Emergency Project: Cold Weather Waterproof Mittens (Part 2)

So last weekend I finished up the cold weather mittens just in time for the craziest weather we have seen in years.  The mittens are usable and soft, but not exactly the couture work I prefer to produce.  All in all, the wearers are happy and warm so it all ended well.  But some notes on the journey there.

I printed and cut out all of the patterns from my previous post (Emergency Project: Cold Weather Waterproof Mittens Part 1).  I looked them all over and ended up using the pattern from FleeceFun.com.

I had originally wanted to make these mittens waterproof but the weather came upon me faster than I had planned and a trip to the fabric store was not panning out.  I ended up pulling out the stash fabrics.  I usually sew for adult women so I did not have much fabric that was honestly appropriate for the cause. Thanks to a spree of pajama pant making in the fall, I did have small stash of polar fleece fabric.

I am not too fond of this stuff, but it makes good for items for the little ones and my husband that will need to withstand many trips through the wash and still stay warm.  Honestly for my husbands mitts I wish I would have had some boiled wool.  I could have gotten out the wool fiber and felted the proper fabric by hand, but spending hours laying out wool and then felting it in the middle of a snow storm was just not appealing.

Onto some shop talk.  I started out wanting to make these mittens extra warm, so I cut the outer layer from polar fleece and the lining from cotton flannel. I had a "bright" idea to use some fusible fleece batting on the lining fabric to increase the warmth.  I was also very "smart" and cut and fused both of the child sized gloves before really testing this idea out.

After assembly line rotary cutting the pieces and fusing the fleece I started sewing the mittens up.  There are good instructions on the site, but the seam allowance of 1/2 inch for both the lining and outer fabric did not work out so well.  I did the first glove using and trimmed it as best I could, but the thumb became way too small with the lining.  Additionally, my youngest boy did not like the stiffness of the fused flannel in the glove.  So for speed and sanity, on the kids gloves I skipped the lining.

To get the elastic in, I used some ribbon to create a casing inside the glove and 1/4 inch elastic to hold the glove on.  I just did quick rolled hem on the edge and voila, a mitten.  My older son soon decided he needed his gloves EXACTLY the same as his brother.  (My boys are 17 months apart, so they are more like twins.  They are also 5 and 7).  So in the same manner, mitten set number two was produced.

Now, on to my husband's mittens.  After my mistakes with the mittens for my kids, I decided to try a few changes.  I fused fleece to the large back hand piece but not to thumb lining pieces.  I was hoping this would add some wind resistance.  I also used 1/2" seam allowance on the lining pieces and a 1/4" seam allowance to the outer pieces to account for the bulk created by the two seams touching and the extra thickness in the fabrics.  I also decided to bind the edges rather than turn them.  I was lazy and sometimes I just don't want to turn pieces through a small hole when they are odd shaped.

It turns out I was correct and my hubby tested the mittens out a lot over the past few days.  The temps have been below zero here and he said his mittens kept his hands quite warm.  The kids love their gloves too.  They may not have turned out waterproof or quite the seamstress mastery I like to create, but my customers are happy and hands are warm so I can feel happy with a job well done.