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Wednesday, December 7, 2011

Tutorial - a petal pin pocket

A few months ago, I made a petal pin pocket for a friend.  Since then, I've had a few people ask me how did I make it.  Actually, it's very simple, so in response I thought I might try to make a quick tutorial.

What do you need?
- fabric 25cm x 50cm (or two pieces, each 25cm x 25cm)
- pellon 25cm x 25cm (pellon is lightweight fusible wadding)
- felt 20cm x 20cm (buy at Spotlight, Lincraft or a craft store like Riot)
- a small button
- pins
all the necessary 'ingredients'
Drop me a message for the pattern pieces (I don't know how to attach a PDF to this blogger page) and I will email them through to you.  Alternatively, let me know how I can attach a PDF to this post!

You need to cut of two pieces of the main petal pattern from the fabric.
pinned and ready to cut
Once that's done, you will also need to cut a main petal pattern piece from the pellon.  Fuse the pellon to the wrong side of one of the fabric pieces.  This piece will be the outside fabric for the pin pocket.
Left piece has the fused pellon attached, right piece will be the inside fabric
On the fabric piece that does not have the pellon, mark the centre on the right side of the fabric (I use a chalk pencil for this).  Then, make a  2"-4" (5-10cm) cut around the centre of the piece (not on centre that you have just marked, just close to it).  This is what you are going to use to pull the pocket through after sewing it together, so try to keep it as small as possible.  Keep the cut smaller than the felt piece, as the felt will go over the cut so you will never see it.
After the cut has been made
Cut the felt piece out.  Mark the centre. Now you are ready to sew!

Putting the right sides together, sew around the two large fabric pieces using a 1/4" seam, backstitching at the start and end of the sewing.  (Hint : the pellon is on the outside while you are sewing.)

Once you have sewn around the outside edge, you will need to trim and cut the seam allowances back. Use small sharp scissors to take notches up to the stitch line but take care not to cut through the stitch line.  Once you have done that around the entire edge, pull the pocket through the small cut you had made on the fabric without pellon, taking care not to rip the cut further.  Roll the edges between your fingers to help it sit flat and then press with an iron.

Now match the centre mark on the felt with the centre mark on the fabric.  Pin the felt in place, matching the curves.
Showing how the felt is pinned down
(orange lines indicate where to sew)
Now sew from one side to the other side, four times.  This is what provides the petal appearance and gives the 'fold' lines for the pocket.

Now, on the tab, sew a button hole, measuring the button you are going to us to give you the length required.  (I love an automatic button hole!)

Once the botton hole is done, sew the button on the outside, on the edge opposite to the button hole.  And viola, you're done!  Put a few pins in it and it's perfect as a small gift.

Variation - if you don't want to do a buttonhole, it would be easy enough to use a small loop of hat elastic.  Put this in as you are sewing the two fabric pieces together (would be on the inside while you are sewing).  If you do this, I would probably cut the tab off and re-shape that side to be the same as the others, in terms of continuing the curve.






I reckon all of this can be done in about 30 minutes.  Too easy! :)

3 comments:

  1. Hoped over from EB, thanks for sharing this tutorial, I've never seen anything like it before, would be great to store all my different sized sewing machine needles. Would you be able to send me the PDF? Thanks in advance.

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  2. I made a few of these recently but from a tute on another blog they are quite cute

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  3. bbjb : If you can let me know the site, I'll link to it. My pattern is something I drew up myself, so it's not as clean as a professional-style pattern. I'm happy to link to another website for the same project.

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