Teacher Gifts 2016 Edition with Sew4Home Patterns

For the last few years I have sewn gifts for teachers ...... purely for selfish reasons - on a balance I would prefer to spend my time deciding between fabrics rather than deciding between chocolates or mugs!!

 

When I need sewing patterns for gifts, one of my favourite sites is sew4home.com. The picture for the Airstream Travel Bag turned up in an e-mail from them very recently and it seemed like the perfect teacher gift. It's particularly suitable for my son's teacher who has told the class about some of her trips to Dubai & America.

My fabric and ribbon choices are very different to the original, and I made some alterations to the pattern.

 

 

Firstly I added a flower brooch to the outside. This brooch is a pattern I have been testing and proof-reading for an English translation 'Sew Snappy' of a Dutch sewing pattern book 'Zo Geknipt' which will be launched in Oct 2016.

 

I omitted the piping from the pattern, which if you have time, is a good addition as it helps provide structure to the bag. Instead, I topstitched the inside binding to the outer curves, with stitching on the outside and this worked perfectly.

 

 

 

The third main change was to fully line the inside. The pattern indicates that the base and zipper portion should only be lined, but it is very straightforward to cut extra front and back pieces and then bind them inside.

 

The ribbons are stitched on the fabric as indicated in the instructions. These are two different stitched ribbons from Jane Means.

 

 

 

My daughter had 3 teachers this year and I wanted a pattern for their gifts that would be faster to sew. Her year had two teachers who were job-sharing and then another who just did maths with her class. Interestingly this worked very well, better than what could be imagined. The pattern I chose is also from sew4home.com.

 

 

The Roll-up Make-up Brush pattern is one I have used a few times before. Because it is so easy to sew, you can have fun with fabric and ribbon selections.

 

 

 

Most of the fabric, binding and ribbons are from my stash. The outer corduroy is from a European fabric company Stenzo. The bindings are Japanese from superbuzzy.com (a shop with all things Japanese that I wish I had shares in!) and the 'chocolate and turquoise' spotted ribbon is from Jane Means.

 

The top inner fabric is a laminated cotton 'Parson Gray' and the quilted cotton pockets is from Patty Young.

 

I can't describe fully how easy this gift is, to sew. The most time-consuming part is sewing the lines for the pockets.

 

 

 

 

Another version of the same pattern, this time with a flower brooch ( I enthusiastically sewed a few of these brooches, in my testing of the Sew Snappy pattern!)

 

All from my stash, the outer fabric is also a Patty Young fabric, the binding is Liberty of London and the striped ribbon is Jane Means

 

 

 

The inside fabrics are an oilcloth bought locally and the quilting cotton pocket fabric is Heather Bailey.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I would sew these for all the teachers every year if it was possible, but the children sometimes have teachers for more than one year. Maybe if I passed them off or label them as pen holders or pencil holders or cutlery holders instead of Make-up Brush holders, it might work!!!

 

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Handmade Bags - A Pattern Book Review

Having sewn small bags from Japanese Pattern books previously, I was delighted when this new English translation of a book of bag patterns from Tuttle Publishing arrived.

Emiko Takahashi's book, Handmade Bags in Natural Fabrics, has 25 individual full-sized patterns from which 60 bags can be sewn. There are easy patterns for tote bags, bags with zips and pockets, shopping basket bags, and purses with clasps.

 

 

 

 

The information in the book is very detailed, even including a section on the different types of interfacing and wadding to be used in each bag. All patterns have to be traced and are in both inches and centimetres. Seam allowances (all illustrated) have to be added when cutting.

 

 

 

 

There are various types of straps and handles shown, and 2 pages of sewing basics (sewing and hem stitches and seam finishes) are also presented. This book of bag patterns provides all the information needed for handstitching each bag.

 

I had a momentary lapse of reason when I considered handsewing a bag, but thankfully that passed quickly when I realised that the pattern instructions can be easily adapted to machine sewing!

 

 

 

 

The bag I picked to sew was the Reversible Full-circle Bag, mainly because there was a completely different use that I planned for it.

 

 

 

 

It is a lined circular bag with loops (or cord carriers) at intervals around the edges. The 16 individual loops are sewn from folded rectangles of fabric. As a change to the pattern I used lengths of red and green stitched ribbon from Jane Means. Using ribbon made sewing the bag much, much faster.

 

 

The final bag was sewn in a floral cotton fabric with a red satin contrast fabric from my stash. As the bag is reversible, either of these fabrics can be on the outside. The bag straps are from a length of cord with is threaded through the ribbon loops.

 

 

 

 

 

And the alternative use that I planned for it?

Well that caused many puzzled looks and hilarity when I told my family that it was a skirt for a tree, they really thought that it was a joke, until they saw it in place and they were very impressed!

I got the idea from similar patterns I have seen on the Internet. If made larger, this can be used as a floor mat and then gathered up to help tidy away toys, for example.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The book is designed for beginners which I would mostly agree with. There are no cutting layouts, and though they are not necessary for sewing the bags, they make layout and cutting a easier for anyone with little sewing experience. However 6 of the bags are illustrated in more detail with photo tutorials, and all the illustration have the usual excellent detail associated with Japanese sewing patterns.

There are more patterns that I plan on sewing from this book. One in particular is the purse pattern (lower left above) which includes instructions on how to use a purse frame. The clear illustrations make it look much easier than I thought it would be.

 

 

 

(Tuttle Publishing sent me this pattern book free. All opinions are my own. I have been happily sewing from Japanese language pattern books since 2009)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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