Category: Sewing

Kindle Pouch Pattern

Have you been looking for a pouch for your Kindle, but not able to find quite what you were looking for? This week I decided to tackle this problem and designed my own Kindle pouch pattern.

I love reading, and with the amount of books that I get through in a week, I don’t have room for hard copies of all of my books so switched to a Kindle e-reader. Last year for Christmas I was lucky enough to get a Kindle Voyage. It has an adaptive side light so I can read it at night without it affecting my sleep, and it goes everywhere with me. I read it to wake up in the morning, on the bus to and from work, and at night to help me drift off to sleep!

With my job I do a bit of travel, and I have been worrying about breaking the screen of my trusty Kindle. While my old Kindle’s case does fit, the power button couldn’t be accessed and it slipped around a bit. I’d been keeping an eye out for new cases but the ones that I liked didn’t ship to Australia. I decided to design and make my own pouch to store my kindle while travelling.

Kindle Pouch | MeaganMade.com

For this pouch I’ve used some of the lovely Tula Pink fabric that I picked up at the Sydney Craft Fair, and since I couldn’t make my mind up between two of the prints, I decided to make the pouch reversible. I have also included a layer of wadding to cushion the Kindle from small impacts.

Kindle Pouch Option 2 | MeaganMade.com

These fabrics are called The Hypnotizer and The Wanderer from the Chipper line of Tula Pink fabrics in the Raspberry colour. Lovely to work with and these colours are perfect for me. I’ve included a list of materials and the instructions to make this pouch below. I have made this with smaller pieces incase you wanted to include different colour pieces for front and back, or if you’d like to quilt some of the pieces, though this would make it harder to turn inside out.

This pattern is designed to fit the Kindle Voyage size, but at the end of the pattern I will give instructions on how to customise it for your device.

Materials:

  • 1 fat quarter of extrernal fabric*  (A)
  • 1 fat quarter of internal fabric* (B)
  • 1/4 yard of cotton wadding
  • Cotton in a coordinating colour with fabric

* I only used about 1/4 of these fat quarter pieces, but if your fabric is directional you may need to place the pieces in different arrangements and use more of the fabric. You could purchase a quarter yard of fabric but this will only work of the pattern is non-directional or the pattern is oriented correctly.

Directions:

Cut the following sized pieces:

  • 7.5″ x 5.5″ main pouch pieces
    • 2 in fabric A
    • 2 in fabric B
    • 2 in wadding
  • 3″ x 5.5″ flap pieces
    • 1 in fabric A
    • 1 in fabric B
    • 1 in wadding

Kindle Pouch Piece Layout | MeaganMade.com

  1. Take the main pouch pieces in Fabric A and wadding and layer them in the following order from bottom to top:
    • Wadding
    • Fabric A face up
    • Fabric A face down
    • Wadding
  2. With these four layers now aligned, sew with a scant 1/4″ seam along the two side (long) edges and bottom edge.
  3. Trim corners and any excess wadding then turn inside out, turning the corners as you go.
  4. Take the main pouch pieces in fabric B and layer them so that the right sides of the fabric are facing each other.
  5. Sew with a scant 1/4″ seam along the two side edges and bottom edge, leaving a 1.5″ break in the middle of the bottom edge to allow for later turning.
  6. Insert exterior (fabric A) pocket into interior (fabric B) pocket, so that right sides are facing each other.
  7. Sew around top edges to join the layers with a scant 1/4″ seam.
  8. Pull exterior (A) fabric out through gap in the bottom seam of the interior (B) fabric.
  9. Top sew along the gap to close the opening. then push lining back inside of exterior fabric (A).
  10. Take the flap pieces and layer them in the following order:
    • Batting
    • Fabric A face up
    • Fabric B face down
  11. Mark a point on the bottom edge (5.5″ side) 1″ from each side. Draw a line to the corresponding top corner to give angled sides. Cut along this line (See red lines in diagram below).Template for flap | MeaganMade.com
  12. Sew a scant 1/4″ seam along all edges, leaving a 1.5″ gap for turning along top edge.
  13. Turn so that right sides of the fabric are facing out and top sew along top edge to close gap
  14. Pin flap piece onto back of the finished piece so that it is attached to Fabric A and the long edge is parallel to the top edge of the pouch, and sits 1/2″ in from edge of fabric (see earlier pictures of finished pouch for guidance).
  15. Attach flap to pouch by sewing along long edge the flap piece (Where you top sewed to close the gap earlier on the flap piece).
  16. When your Kindle is inserted, simply tuck the flap piece inside the pouch and your Kindle is nicely protected from scratches and bumps.

Kindle Pouch | MeaganMade.com

Instructions for adapting pouch to your size requirements.

My Kindle measures 6.4″ x 4.5″ x 0.30″ . I rounded up the height to 6.5″ then added a half inch to the height and width to give me the main pouch piece sizes. Mine fits quite tightly, so if your kindle is thicker than mine, you may need to add extra allowance to the width and height for this. I decided on the height of 3″ for the flap piece and this seemed proportional to the rest of the pouch, but you can change this as you wish.

If you need anything clarified let me know! 🙂

Happy sewing,

Meagan x

Accuquilt Quilt Design – Stage 1

Browsing through my emails last week, I stumbled across one from Spotlight which had the magic word – “Discount”! There was a line of Buzoku cotton with metallic gold highlights (a slightly heavier weight 100% cotton) that I quickly fell in love with, and I knew that I had to try designing a quilt with this fabric.

Fabric Samples | MeaganMade.com

Now, there’s a slight hitch in this plan, I’ve never made a quilt with anything more complicated than plain squares, but with my recent Accuquilt purchase, I was feeling game. The Accuquilt GO! fabric cutter uses dies to cut material exactly to size, every time. Cutting the fabric is my least favourite part of the whole quilting process, mostly because I’m a bit of a perfectionist and it normally involves multiple re-cuts and takes forever.

With this cutter you can cut through up to 6 layers of cotton fabric at once. While it was a bit of an expensive purchase, I think it will be worth it if I do more quilting as a result. I also purchased the 9″ Qube which gives me the option of creating 79 different squares all 9″ in size, and I have been using the Quarter Square Triangle (4.5″ finished square) die.

AccuQuilt Cutter | MeaganMade.com

This was the first time I have used the cutter, and it was quite simple to use. I used a cardboard template that I made to be slightly larger than the triangle, and used the leftover from the first pass to make a second. With one row of fabric I was able to get 14 triangles, and all within about 3 minutes. It probably took longer to square up the fabric and cut the row than to cut all the triangles.

Cut quarter square triangles | MeaganMade.com

The dog-eared corners from the die made the sewing process a little easier. After a few false starts with the wrong sewing foot, I finally got 4 squares with some good sharp corners. I’m so happy with the combo of light and dark fabrics, but I think I’ll need to put some plain sashing between the squares as the patterns are quite busy when put next to each other. I have a die to cut 2.5″ strips, so I think I’ll use those, but now I need to work out what colour. Perhaps dark grey, or maybe gold?

Completed squares | MeaganMade.com

I’m still finalising the design, so let me know what colour you’d suggest in the comments below, and I’ll bring you some updates in the weeks to come!

Happy quilting,

Meagan x

Insulated lunch bag

This week has been so busy that I’ve barely had time to cook let alone craft, so I’ve decided to post about a lunch bag that I made last year! 🙂

I’d purchased a great bento lunch box for work, complete with smaller boxes and separators. There was only one problem – it was huge – so huge it wouldn’t fit into any of my lunch bags! There was only one thing for it – time to get sewing.

An earlier trip to Spotlight had netted me some cool fabric with a modern purple print, but I hadn’t yet decided what to make with it! A search on Etsy solved the problem after I found this great pattern. I contacted the seller as I loved the pattern but it wasn’t quite the right dimensions for my box. Super quick to respond, Robin sent me her formula to modify the pattern of the bag, and it did the trick! Make sure you read to the end for a discount code for this store! 🙂

Insulated Lunch Box

The trickiest thing with pulling this pattern together was the thickness of the layers combined! This lunch bag uses insulated wadding (I bought InsulBright) to keep your food nice and cool. I decided to use a thin plastic tablecloth for the inside material so that I could wipe out any spills and it’s been a fantastic bag to use ever since. (Of course the fact that I could buy it in bright pink just closed the deal for me, my two favourite colours pink and purple combined!)

To get through the fabric, Insulbrite and plastic tablecloth I used a denim needle which is much stronger. This needle powered through the layers and didn’t break, unlike my prior standard needle that I had tried. The tablecloth did bunch in a few corner spots, but it was easier for me to find than oil cloth and has survived many a meal spill.

Insulated Lunch Box - an inside peek

I recently contacted Robin to see if I could blog about her great little lunch bag. Robin has been so kind as to give us a discount code to use in her store binskistudio until the end of August 2016 for 10% off any products in her store! The code is MEAGANMADE10. I’m personally eyeing off those e-reader and wallet patterns!

I’d love to hear what patterns you buy and make, or any other comments you may have! Drop me a line below, and don’t forget to share the post 🙂

Happy sewing,

Meagan xo

Origami Pouch

The Craft and Quilt Fair came to Sydney last weekend, and I got a chance to attend on Sunday. I haven’t been for a few years, but this show always has the best variety of stalls and is a fantastic day. True to form, I came away with many purchases, including the kit and pattern for this origami pouch!

With every craft conceivable was represented at the fair, I had to limit myself to a few crafts. Sticking to those I’ve done in the last year I decided on sewing, quilting and crocheting! I met some wonderful people at the show, and it was great to catch up with one of my lovely crafting friends Mandy who had 2 of her gorgeous patterns for sale at the show and was also helping out on the AccuQuilt stall (I’ll be having some fun with those cutting dies in the coming months so stay tuned)! I also bought some beautiful fabrics, including some from the Tula Pink line, and some lovely Alpaca/Merino blend yarn, so you can expect to see more goodies from the show featuring in coming posts!

I had planned to post about a beanie that I had been crocheting this week, but was foiled! The one time I was trying to be good and purchase only the yarn that I “needed”, I didn’t buy enough, lol! Never fear, more yarn is on its way and once I receive it I will be able to show you this cozy beanie.

What I did manage to finish this week was a lovely small Origami Pouch, made using a kit from Wabi-Sabi Designs Australia. The kit includes all material and cord required for the pattern as well as instructions, all you need to sort out is the cotton! I couldn’t resist the colours in this gorgeous fabric, it has the greys and pinks that I love and the metallic gold to brighten it up!

Origami pouch material

The pouch has a drawstring to bring it closed, and you get peeks of the black inner fabric when it is full. At first the instructions looked a little daunting, but once you start sewing it together it begins to make sense. One stage involves sewing only two flaps together, and that was probably the trickiest, but with some bunching and folding I was able to do this, and on the whole I’d probably rate this as an intermediate sewing project!

Origami pouch

Now I have the fun part of deciding what to put in this pouch! At the moment I’m thinking of using it for smaller crochet projects like my granny squares for my Crochet Quilt but will see what I feel like. At the stall I was advised that I could follow this same pattern and just increase the square size to make a larger pouch so may give that a go down the track too!

Happy sewing,

Meagan x

Magimix Food Processor Cover

When my old food processor gave up the ghost at the end of last year, I decided it was time to take the plunge and upgrade! After a lot of researching online I ended up settling on the Magimix 5200XL! I love it, and have been cooking up a storm with it ever since.

The body of the unit is quite heavy so this lovely piece of equipment is living on the bench top next to the stove. I didn’t want to get any oil or dust on it, so I decided I would sew a cover, but I wanted it to be nice and colourful!

Step 1 – Find a pattern! I couldn’t find a pattern specifically for the Magimix, but I did find this pattern from the KathieSewHappy store on Etsy. It fit the base measurements of my machine and all I had to do was add a little height to the pieces. Kathie’s pattern does come with instructions to make pockets, but I decided for mine I would prefer it to be reversible and without pockets.

Step 2 – Find the material! I had purchased some bright and colourful material from my local Spotlight store, rainbow and greys for the outside and a deep magenta for the inside. It is a heavy weight cotton, but so lovely and soft to the touch!

Step 3 – Make the cover! Well this was the easy part. Extending the pattern to add the height needed and then sewing it together was easy with Kathie’s simple to follow instructions. Like I mentioned above, I did leave out a few parts, but I was very happy with the finished product.

Step 4 – Enjoy it! Most of the time I leave the Rainbow side face out, but I will change it up from time to time! Here it is 🙂

The rainbow side of my Magimix Cover The magenta side of my Magimix Cover

If you’re looking for a pattern for your food processor, I’d definitely recommend giving this pattern a try!

Happy sewing,

Meagan x