felted sweater purse and coffee sleeves

Years before I had a blog, I made a felted purse. (It was this pattern, extremely easy to knit in a gorgeous Noro yarn and I'm not kidding, I have never had so many strangers stop me on the street and offer to pay me to knit for them. I always just pointed them to the web page, but it's a testament to the pattern and the yarn.)

I thought about this little handbag as winter was setting in and the summer bag no longer seemed appropriate. However, I've got another knitting project going right now and really just wanted something quick and functional. Hence:

(Please pardon my unprofessional photo retouching. The handles don't really glow like that. Unfortunately.)

This was an almost fully-salvaged project. The body of the bag is an old boys' sweater that had been felted in the wash. I felted it further to bring the size down and to add strength. It also added thickness, which made it a little trickier to work with—something I'll have to remember next time.

I think you can just see the remains of the ribbed waist at the top here:

The two-way zipper is from a carry-on suitcase that had fallen apart.

And the lining is my aunt's old jumpsuit, which had shredded after one too many washes. It already had a pocket, which now holds a phone or wallet. I added the requisite iPad pocket, as well, and in retrospect wish I'd added interfacing to make it firmer. It's just a bit flimsy for my taste.

As for the straps, I have S to thank. He wanted to make himself a belt. While we were looking at necessary supplies, I saw that I could get a length of leather strapping material that seemed like it would just work. Cut in half and riveted to the body of the bag, it did.

In learning about leather finishing, I came across this recipe for a homemade wax. This was rubbed into the straps after dyeing, and it brought them from being rather stiff to feeling softer and more pliable. D asked me to fix the old broken dog leash* and after riveting the two snapped halves together, the wax also worked wonders as a reconditioner.

leather dog leash before (top) and after wax conditioner

And that was it. Not a fancy project at all, but it suits my needs right now. I really appreciated having a more winterized purse the other day when I was caught in a sudden downpour without an umbrella. Between the leather wax and the wool's natural water repellency, the purse came through just fine.

But my favorite part of the project is not the bag, it's the pair of reusable coffee cup sleeves cut from the felted sweater sleeves and roughly (very roughly) embellished with glow-in-the-dark yarn.

The glow feature is more fun than practical. But the felted wool is a perfect insulator.

I plan to carry the coffee sleeves with me at all times. And now I have a bag to keep them in.



*This particular post is revealing us to have some unsavory hoarding tendencies. Please ignore.

grizzly ukulele kit (daisy)

instruction manual on top

In December 2011 I had just begun playing uke and was also home with a nasty cough. The two converged together into a rush of web browsing, and eventually I came across this diy ukulele kit, on sale at a price that was far lower than the cheapest starter instrument. Of course I ordered one.

neck, body, miscellaneous pieces

Basic as it was, it sat around for many months before I dared to try and assemble it. I don't know much about wood, and it felt incredibly daunting to turn pieces of wood—even pieces that were precut and partially assembled—into a playable instrument.

step 1: gluing the neck to the body

But I eventually started, and soon after I ran into David Iriguchi of Iriguchi Ukuleles. I confessed with much embarrassment that I was starting a kit. Way back in March at the Reno Ukulele Festival, David's concert keystone uke was the first to make me realize what a truly fine instrument sounded like. So it felt akin to telling a sculptor I was going to make a dog out of Playdoh.

step 2: gluing fretboard to neck

But David was characteristically kind and encouraging. He advised looking up other people's chronicles of their kit builds, and said not to worry too much about precision because it would probably turn out okay.

drying

The instructions directed that the fretboard be put on before staining, but the bridge put on after. If there's logic to this, I don't understand it. I thought afterward that I would have rather put the fretboard on after staining, as it was hard to tape up the bottom curved edges well. 

clamping the bridge to the body with the only tool bought for the project. Cost: $3.

The only modification I made was adding a sound port to give me some direct sound feedback. This is a feature that many of David's ukes have, and I really liked it when I tried them last year.

holes stuffed with wadded newspaper and other surfaces wrapped with painters tape for finishing

What's not documented here is all the sanding and finishing. I had thought it would end with the fine grit sandpaper, but then I read about filling the wood grain and sanding that down, too. Then there was staining, cleaning up the leaked areas, drying, and finally spraying several light coats of lacquer.

ready to add tuners and strings

It was rather tedious toward the end, but worth it for the smooth finish on the body. The stain's not perfectly uneven, but in a way that I can live with. Overall, I'm happy enough with how it turned out.

the daisy uke

The kit is branded with the Grizzly name. I wanted to put a bear sticker on the headstock, but couldn't find anything suitable. What I did find was a sheet of daisy stickers. It was S's idea to put a daisy in the sound hole, as well. Now it feels a little like overkill, so I'll probably remove the stickers eventually. Meanwhile, we've gone from calling it the Grizzly to calling her Daisy.

I can't finish this post without mentioning DH's huge contribution to it. It initially sounded a little thunky to me, so he used a tuner and some filing instruments to bring it to a better intonation. This is not something I would have had either the knowledge, patience or courage to try myself; but I'm very grateful that he did. I sold the Dolphin in October, so this is now the main soprano I reach for.

Every time I play it, I remember how I was afraid to start, and how it turned out okay.

Do you have any projects like that?

ukulele reindeer antlers

If only I could stop at the ukulele santa hat, I wouldn't feel quite so insane. But no ukulele Christmas is complete without a round of Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer, and that calls out for a matching headpiece. 

Uh, doesn't it...?

This was just a couple of chenille stems wrapped around the headstock and with a glittery red pom-pom glued to the front. I wanted to be able to take it on and off, so started with a little hook, which was formed around a ruler.

The chenille was wrapped around the headstock horizontally, caught on the hook, and bent up and over the top—

—and twisted around the other side.

Nose glued on.

Antlers formed from another stem any old how.

The Flea headstock is rectangular, but the majority probably have this pointed tip in the middle. For those, a different configuration might work better:

DH saw these and cautiously asked if I were planning on making ukulele hats for every holiday. He said it in the tone of someone who has their foot halfway out the door, so I reassured him: No, of course not. These are just for the party.

But we'll see.

ukulele santa hat

When opening the Christmas decorations box this year, I noticed a little Santa hat that probably sat on a doll's head in years past. This year it looked perfect for the ukulele, so that's where it went.

And then I realized I couldn't stop there. We had an ukulele club Christmas party coming up.

I didn't think to start photographing the process until I was nearly done, but it isn't brain surgery and I'm sure you'll be able to adapt it to your own needs.

I eyeballed the hats into isosceles triangles, making them roughly 3" wide, which was the width of my headstock. I was using leftover knit fabric from the Santa hat I made last year, but it should be about the same whether you use fleece or felt or fake fur—anything that has a small amount of stretch to it. Running the warp of the fabric vertically from the peak to the center of the brim will help with the stretch (in other words, the selvedge should run parallel to the silver ruler, below).

A quarter-inch seam took the width down to where it would fit snugly.

All the trim was glued on. I used fabric adhesive because it gave me a little bit of extra control winding that feathery trim, but you could also use a glue gun or anything else that can attach fabric to fabric.

The final, and I think somewhat critical, step was gluing the tops down so that the hats could sit compactly on the headstock when the ukes were in playing position. I folded right over the seam and just added a dab of glue above the trim.

And here's the new, mass-produced version for my club friends. I actually like it a little better than the original due to the softer materials used.

Corny? Very. But also fun, and fun is what we're after when we play.

the bookulele (cigar box ukulele)

Tori, Natalie, and Jen all guessed correctly. I'm impressed! 

It's a bookulele. It had to be called that, right? In fact, I think I may have decided to go ahead and make it when I realized how easily 'lele' attaches to 'book.' And when I saw this title at the library sale, the whole project was sealed.

There are several cigar box ukulele documentations out there, but a couple really inspired me to try my own. One was this shoeboxulele (it had to be called that, right?), which despite being made of a cardboard box, some scrap wood and toothpick frets, sounds pretty good:

The other video doesn't allow embedding, but here is the link. Learning that I could buy a neck, thereby avoid having to measure frets, and then just bolt it on, helped fuel things along. It meant that essentially the project would entail turning the book into a box, finishing and adding the neck, and stringing it up.

I'll document in more detail soon but add that the uke does play, albeit with a rather dampened, muffled sound. It turned out to be a good little travel uke, though, since it can be played in the car or in the room without disturbing anyone.

That may in fact be all it's good for, but I'm enjoying it for now.

ukulele bag #1

This bag was just short of being a disaster, but I'm putting it here, anyway, in recognition of all these projects that are springboards to better ones. I did learn something from it, and with luck the next bag will incorporate that learning.  

I never used the old bag: in addition to not fitting the Gaspar pineapple well, the metal teeth of the zipper drag across the wood whenever the uke goes in or out of the opening. Who thought this would be a good idea? So the starting point for this bag was a long zipper with nylon teeth. I used this Make-A-Zipper roll (no affiliate connection), which I'd originally bought for the Weekender.

The Weekender had also given me some experience using heavy-duty stabilizer and sewing on cording, both of which I adapted to this bag. I didn't take any photos, but the sequence was more-or-less as follows:

1. Traced around the ukulele on butcher paper to make a pattern. At this point, I had a choice of shaping the bag exactly like the pineapple uke or in a more oblong shape which would take out some of the curves. I chose the former—which may have been my first mistake, as it was much harder to sew.
2. Used the pattern to cut pieces for the top and bottom: one each of outer fabric, heavy duty stabilizer (the same Peltex #70 used in the Weekender), iron-on interfacing to hold the Peltex to the fabric (ditto), 1/2" foam and lining fabric. Stabilizer and foam were cut to the exact size of the pattern. The other pieces were cut larger, for seam allowance and trimming.
3. Added a zippered pocket to the top piece.
4. Stitched layers of top and bottom pieces together. The foam was glued in place underneath the lining fabric using 3M Super 77 spray adhesive.
5. Made and added cording around the edges of the ukulele outline.
6. Cut a length of zipper, added 2 pulls facing each other, and stitched one side of this zipper around the top edge.
7. Layered the perimeter piece as in Step 4, and added handle & rings for a shoulder strap.
8. Sewed the other side of the zipper to this perimeter piece.
9. Put flexible plastic in between layers of the perimeter and stitched it to the bottom.
10. Covered all raw edges in bias tape.

It sounds so straightforward, doesn't it? But in fact, I'm sure I redid nearly all the seams at least once. I was figuring the construction out as I went, stitching and restitching, trying to anticipate what the next step might be. It was a haphazard, messy process.

Halfway through, I felt like the stabilizer wasn't working well with the narrow neck shape, so cut up a sheet of flexible plastic to insert into the top and perimeter pieces. 

Once I'd sewn the last seam and turned it right side out, I was dismayed to see how twisted the neck area looked. I ripped it out and restitched it several times before deciding that it was going to have to do. The neck is still twisted, sigh. I think it's probably due to my top and bottom pieces being entirely different shapes—and that is due to the fact that I didn't have a seam line at all, but was trying to sew to the shape of the stabilizer/foam outlines.

the awful twist

What would I do differently next time?

For starters, I would measure and mark much more than I did this one. I was afraid of miscalculating but in the end, probably erred worse in trying to sew by feel instead of having a precise line to follow. Each mismatched fit ended up compounding problems down the road.

And as mentioned in Step 1, a simplified shape would save a lot of headache.

The zippered pocket needs to be moved down several inches. It's really only useful for holding a set of spare strings, so a larger zipper opening would make it easier to slip them in or out.

Next time I'll buy cording instead of making it. I may skip the stabilizer/interfacing combination, too. In the end, it just seemed like a headache to have to sew around. I didn't find this to be so with the trapezoidal shape of Weekender, but it was a bear trying to follow these tighter curves. I'd rather just stitch around the cording and insert a piece of plastic, as I ended up doing with this one, anyway.

Finally, the next bag will be sewn on an old Singer. I used the Pfaff because it was already set up from another project, but I don't like its zipper foot as much. The Singer zipper foot can sew right up close, whereas the Pfaff's doesn't seem as well designed to me, with a wider distance from the needle to the edge of the foot.

Singer zipper foot

Pfaff zipper foot

So that's the first attempt at an ukulele bag. It's funky—that's the nicest way I can put it—but at least it cost me nearly nothing, as all the fabric and hardware was in my stash or recycled from other pieces. I think the foam, plastic and bias tape cost a total of about $5. And now I can take the Gaspar to the Reno Uke Fest.

Still...I hope the next ukulele bag turns out better than this one. If you've made one of your own and/or have ideas on how this one could be improved, I would really love to hear from you.

amy butler weekender, part 4

Evening Three. The good news is that you will essentially have done all the steps that are involved in making the lining. It uses the same pattern and procedure as the outer shell.


But you may want to add interior pockets to the main panels, so do that before sewing all the panels together. My laptop pocket was made like the main exterior pockets, but sized to the height of the laptop for additional security.

My zippered pocket, as mentioned in part 1, was made using this tutorial.

I slightly regret using a zipper I had on hand instead of buying one that matched

I had forgotten to pick up template plastic for the false bottom, so substituted a piece of lawn sign.

This worked so well that I am now always looking for discarded lawn signs as lightweight, water resistant reinforcement.


I really enjoyed making the Weekender. It was laid out so thoroughly that a novice seamstress could get through the directions, simply following it step-by-step.


My final notes:

• plan your fabric. As mentioned in an earlier post, I had visions of doing my bag in a sunny, bright floral. Unfortunately, I didn't get to the fabric store until late fall, by which time florals were depleted. I ended up choosing paisley that day: black paisley for the outside and a pale green paisley for the lining. I even recovered the rocking chair in paisley. I'm not really sure how that happened.
• on a similar note, the heavy decorator fabrics recommended for this project, while normally expensive, do go on sale from time to time. It was such a sale that prompted me to finally begin the bag.
• consider your additions, particularly your interior pockets, and mark into your pattern where they will be done. This may save you a lot of headache later.
• searching through blogs gave me a renewed appreciation for good blog organization. If you choose to write up your own experience with the Weekender (or with any other project, for that matter), please be sure to tag & label your posts, make sure your archives are visible, and consider adding a search function to your blog.

My own minor modifications have all been noted before, but here they are again:

• lengthened the bag by 1"
• made the straps in the main color
• widened the straps by 1"
• lengthened the straps by 4" (these two changes made it possible to sling the bag over one shoulder, which I really, really like)
• added magnetic closures to the outer main pockets
• changed the bottom exterior panel to pleather
• added feet to the bottom exterior panel; added a laptop pocket to the interior lining
• added a zippered pocket to the interior lining

amy butler weekender, part 3

Evening Two:

• attached zipper and end pockets to the top panel. I don't have photos of this, but I remember it was much easier than the previous evening. There are no extra layers or cording in the top panel, so it's just a matter of sewing a zipper between two pieces of fabric, and stitching the pockets on.

• attached bottom panel to this top panel. I used a piece of vinyl pleather I had for the bottom. 
• attached the top/bottom panel piece to the main panels. You do need a zipper foot, but I had one for my trusty old Singer 301 and it worked fine. There may be a few places where the cording doesn't get tucked in tight enough and need to be resewn. It would probably help if one pinned a little better than shown.

If you plan to add feet, do so now. The shell of the bag is now complete, and all that is left is sewing and attaching the lining.

amy butler weekender, part 2

The Weekender Travel Bag pattern is detailed and very clear. I can't imagine you will go wrong if you are careful in following it. Myself, I just noticed a big black ribbon across the top with advice to "...read through all of the instructions before you get started on your project. Be sure to pre-wash and press all of your fabric..." Oops.

But pre-reading (in addition to pre-washing) is a good idea. In particular, reading through the pattern is helpful in gathering supplies. As others have noted, one only needs 4 pieces of cording, not 5 continuous yards. And as the cording along the pockets runs straight, it can be covered in fabric cut with the grain instead of on the bias. I did this and was able to stretch my fabric, as I did not have quite enough. You can see below how much I had to piece fabric to get a bias strip. The two straight pieces sit beneath the bias strip.

One reason I was tight on fabric is that I added an inch in length to the bag. I wanted to be able to slip my laptop inside, and the extra inch made that possible.


The other reason was a cutting mistake. Because of the way the pattern was folded to fit inside its cover, I inadvertently used it as the fold line even though the actual fold line is very clearly and heavily marked. So my advice, if you are careless like I am, is to tape the non-functional crease straight as I finally did, below.

Evening One went like this:

• cut out all pieces, including Peltex and interfacing pieces. This is time-consuming, particularly when changing the dimensions, as I did. 1" needed to be added to all affected pieces, which is to say, to all pieces. I also added 1" and 4" to the width and length, respectively, of the carrying straps and associated Peltex pieces.
• made cording. As noted, I had to stretch my fabric a bit due to my changes and hastiness. If you make the bag as written and are careful in following directions, making the cording is a simple procedure. You cut and sew together bias strips, then wrap the strips around your cotton cording, sealing with Stitch Witchery or something similar.

• made the main pocket with cording
• made the handles
• attached the handles, main pocket and cording to the main panels. If adding any details to the main pocket (i.e., a snap closure or zipper), do so before stitching the pocket to the main panel.

This first evening ended with the two main panels complete.