O.K. so don't shoot the messenger but ... Christmas is approaching rapidly! You may have felt safe and secure in the knowledge that Christmas is ages away, but the countdowns on. Any moment now decorations and fruit mince pies will be appearing in supermarkets. Christmas carols will start to feature on their P.A systems. Toy catalogues are already reminding us that the giving season is approaching! Arghhh where has the year gone? Sorry for the cliche but it seems like just yesterday we were getting ready for Layla's first Christmas, and here we are barrelling towards the second. I hadn't given much thought to Christmas until I spotted this hiding underneath a Spotlight table.
Cute right! It's vinyl and not overtly Christmasy, a lot of Christmas fabric is garish, and it was on sale! I grabbed 3m's and when they zapped the little sale sticker it came up even cheaper again! Don't you love it when that happens! It ended up costing a measly $2.45 a metre.
So I have a lot of ideas running round my head for this fabric. First off the rank is a Christmas Binder, perfect for organising all of my Christmas plans.
Its so straight forward -
First lay your binder on the material, then figure out what size "pockets" you want. The pockets are what the front and back cover of the binder slide into. My pockets were 10" for the front and 6" for the back. I made the front pocket large so I could slip things behind it, or add a pocket to the front. I cut a 1" seam allowance top and bottom.
Second hem the short ends. Just fold the vinyl over once, run your finger nail along the crease so that you don't need to pin the hem in place - any pins will leave a permanent mark. Sew down the edge. I found that the bottom stitches were a bit wonky because the vinyl is slippery, but the top looked fine. Just make sure you sew with the right side of the fabric (the side that people will see) facing you. That way the neater stitches will be visible and the ugly stitches will be hidden.
Third lay your binder back on the fabric and mark the corners, the binder spine and where your pockets end when folded over the binder. Fold one pocket right sides together and sew along the top and bottom edges. Then trim the seam allowance and corners before turning the pocket right side out. Vinyl's a bit stiff and can mark easily so do this carefully. If it does mark up, a little bit of heat can help it relax and look perfect again. Before repeating this process on the other pocket, cover the binder and make sure the second pocket mark you made still lines up - mine didn't any more. Make a new mark if needed, and then make the second pocket.
Cover binder to ensure a good fit. My seam allowance ended up being smaller then 1" on the top and bottom due to wonky cutting. So my plan to top stitch the bottom and top edge got thrown out the window! In true make do fashion I've stuck the seam down with double sided tap. For a make do fix it's lasting pretty well!
I then created some Xmas bunting out of felt and vinyl off cuts for the front. I sewed the bunting triangles on using French knots. Do not be intimidated by French knots- I know they have a bad rap because I used to be scared too! They really aren't tricky, they just require two hands.
Because it makes me want to pull my hair out that page dividers for binders are never wide enough - you know how they become invisible if you use plastic sleeves rather then putting pages directly in?! I bulked mine up with vinyl off cuts. I cut two pieces and then used double sided tape to attach them. I love how they turned out!! A vinyl cover like this would be PERFECT for a recipe binder, you can just wipe it down. Will be keeping my eyes peeled for more cheap vinyl!
So now I'm ready to get Christmas organised. And I'm starting to hunt through Pinterest looking for printabales, and recipes, and crafty ideas, and decorations and.....
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