Make Craft Game

So, I started to think, what can I do to make better use of the space? I think boxes are my go-to solution for everything. But to be fair, if it works, why change? As I looked around, I realized the box size that I really wanted just wasn’t common. And some of the options I found were rather expensive.

But my signature weakness is definitely “I’ll do it myself!” so crafting something seemed like a good solution. After some plotting and planning, I finally came up with a fabric book box design that I really adore. I was able to use some sewing techniques I hadn’t really used before. And learned some really helpful lessons along the way.

The first step is prepping the fabric. This consisted of cutting and ironing. As I see more and more, I am really seeing the importance of ironing fabric in order for it to be in its best condition when being sewn. It takes out the wrinkle variable which ultimately reduces some of the mistakes that can happen when the fabric accidentally clumps.

I cut the patterned fabric, the plain fabric, and the stabilizer into 5 pieces. This gave me 5 different pieces of fabric at 3 different sizes. Two of the sizes had duplicate copies since the sides should be the same.

The fabric stabilizer that I use is an iron on one. I decided to iron the stabilizer onto the patterned fabric. This was actually a mistake but not a major one. And I didn’t realize how big of a mistake this would be until I finished the piece. So, I’ll talk more about this later.

Then I went onto sewing the pieces together to create the fabric book box. I started with the patterned fabric. I had 3 different sized pieces (all attached to the stabilizing fabric) – Short (5 by 6), Wide (5 by 13), and Bottom (6 by 13). In the images, I also labeled each edge where A goes to A, B goes to B, etc. Since the short and wide pieces are the same size, it doesn’t really matter how each edge is determined. All that’s really important at this point it to make sure the fabric is all facing the same way.

The way I sew the piece caused the pattern to face towards the inside of the box. I combined each edge together as closely as I could to the edge lines, only about ¼ inch inward was my goal. Once I had all the edges of the inside sewed together, I had a horrible realization. To get this pattern on the outside, and to hide the edge stitches, I would have to turn the box inside out.

Now, normally this wouldn’t be a problem with a project. But I was making a box and was depending on the stabilized fabric to provide rigidity. Turning the box inside out would curve the stabilizer and compromise the whole box. But I pushed forward to see what I could make with this development.

Making the inside was an identical process to making the outside. But the big difference came at the end when I saw that I didn’t have to turn the fabric inside out in order to have the piece face in the correct direction. Oops. If I was to do this again, I would stabilize the inside fabric as this

would give the box better stability.

Now I had a box inside of the fabric book box. With no connection, this wasn’t going to work. I wanted to create an exterior edging to hide the seams and connect the two pieces. When I have done this before, I have typically used the inside fabric and made a tube of it. But why create a ribbon when I have ribbon?

I have a lot of ribbons, but I have never really gotten the hang of how to use them. Since they felt like a delicate touch, and I really have to be paying attention to do any sort of intricate work. But using it for edging a piece was one of those uses that always slipped my mind.

I decided to go with a contrasting color and used clips to hold the whole thing in place. Since I needed to sew together both sides with the same stitch for a good look, setting up was especially important. Right before I started to sew the ribbon on, I felt a lot of pressure to make sure nothing moved.