Tutorial: Drawstring Wet Bag

This is a perfect, quick project for taking your suits on all those trips to and from the pool and beach.  The bag is lined with a water resistant fabric that lets you throw your wet suits in this bag and not get everything else in you pool bag soaking wet.  You can make these in any size you want you'll just have to adjust the measurement to suit your needs.  Here we go...

Materials:

• 34 x 12 rectangle of fabric for the outside of your bag (I used a sand dollar fabric)
• 2 rectangles of 16.5 x 12 PUL (polyurethane laminated fabric) bought at my local Joann's Fabrics
• 1 yard of nylon cording for the drawstring
• 1 cord stop
• coordinating thread

After you have your 3 rectangles cut, place the outside fabric right side up.  Then place your PUL fabric right side down at each end and pin the two ends in place. There will be an inch gap in the middle, as shown above.  Sew each end.

Take your super long rectangle and fold it in half with right sides together.  From the fold measure up 13 1/2 inches and put a pin on the edge.  Then measure 3/4 inch from that pin and place another pin.  This will be the opening to pull the drawstring through.  You will not sew this gap closed!!!

After securing your fabric with pins, it's time to get sewing.  Sew along the 3 sides leaving the drawsting opening and the opening to turn your bag right side out at the end of the PUL fabric.  Remember to back stitch on each side of the openings to give it some extra strength.

Turn your bag right side out.  To close the opening in the PUL fabric, top stitch across that end of the bag from end to end.

Tuck your PUL lining into the bag.  Because your PUL fabric is a little shorter than the outer fabric, you need to work the lining down in the bag.  Now it's time to sew the casing for the drawsting.  Simply find the opening on the side and sew 2 straight lines on each side all the way around the bag.  Make sure to back stitch where the opening is.  (Don't sew the bag with the cording in...I forgot to take a picture of this step until I was done with the bag :o)

After your casing is sewn, use a safety pin to feed the cording through the bag.  I used a lighter to seal the ends of the cording to prevent fraying.  Thread your cord stop through and ta-da!  You have a stylish water proof bag to tote around your wet suits all summer long.  This finished bag measures about 11 x 16 and can hold a couple kiddie suits and maybe an adult suit.  You would need to make a bigger one for the entire family though.

PS.  Don't put this bag in the dryer or you'll have a stuck together mess.  It is safe to throw in the washing machine though. Oh and you shouldn't iron the lining either.  You could pull the lining out to iron the outside fabric if it gets too wrinkly for your taste.  Happy sewing!!

Quiet Time Coloring

More super cute coloring pages over at Vale Design.  Her coloring pages are always so cute and just the thing for a few quiet moments for mommy.  These work great while I'm trying to fix dinner.  If I give her some stickers too, she's in heaven and quiet for a whole 10 minutes...15 if I'm lucky!

Magic and Pizza

Friday night we visited the Magic House with some friends and their littles.  We had a blast.  The Magic House is a great place for exploring and all our kids are reaching the age where they really have started to enjoy the Magic House.  Every 3rd Friday night from 5:30 to 9:00 you can get in for free with your family.  Just thought I would pass that along to all the fellow St. Louisians looking for something free to do.  We made it for about 2 hours and then a few meltdowns started to happen, so we opted for some pizza down the street.  Steve and I had never been to Dewey's Pizza so I wanted to try it out.  The pizza was fantastic and the kids were so good.  We were out chatting and eating until after 9:30 with one of the other couples and their kids.  Ava was in seventh heaven.  She was so good at dinner and it looked like she was finally learning the secret to what grown-ups do after they put the kids to bed and she was LOVING it.  She was giddy that we were still up when it was dark out and she was with her friends!  Steve and I left that night saying we are definitely doing more things like to fill the rest of our summer nights.

A Moving Father's Day

Our Father's Day was busy but so rewarding.  We started the morning at church and then headed home to BBQ with my dad, brother and niece.  After spending a relaxing afternoon with my family we went back to church.  Once a year our church has a baptism celebration.  We are fairly new to the church so this was our first year attending.  We didn't know anyone being baptized but that didn't matter.  It was amazing and inspiring to see over 360 people being baptized and so excited to share it with everyone.  Everyone was cheering and clapping.  There were tears from family members as they watched their loved ones being baptized.  It was awesome.  Ava was cheering and clapping right along with everyone else.  It was a moving experience despite the 93 degree temperature yesterday.

Packaging for Dad

Here is a quick and easy father's day idea to stash some of dad's favorite candies or any other small gifts for his special day.  Over at Paper Crave there is a great tutorial for making these little gift boxes with templetes too.  So cute and quick to whip up.  Happy crafting!

Simple Father's Day Gift

This year for Father's Day I wanted Ava to help make something that Steve could take to work or put on his desk here at home.  I ran across an idea on Martha Stewart's website that I tweaked a little for this project.

1. Print off the DAD template from Martha's site.  I printed mine on cardstock so it was a little more sturdy to work with.  Cut out the templete very neatly.
2. Print out 3 of your favorite pictures of your kiddos.  They will need to be rather small.  That's why I would print out the templete first so you can get an idea of how big the photos need to be.  Since we only have 1 kiddo, it was all Ava in all 3. 
3. Put your photos behind the template and lightly trace so you know about how big to cut the photos.  Cut out photos and then use double sided tape to mount the photos to the DAD cutout.
4. Mount on your favorite color cardstock and then add your artwork to a 5x7 frame.  I was going to have Ava color the background but she was not the least bit interested.  This turned out to be more of a mommy project than an Ava project...oh well.  You could also use an 8x10 frame and there would be more room for the kiddos' artwork. 

Hope that inspired you to get your little ones working on something special for their Dada!

The New Captain Kangaroo??

Our dear Simon, the lionhead, is constantly reinventing his look.  You know  like Madonna or Lady Gaga.  When we first brought him home, he had this cute little mohawk right between his ears.  He then started to get his lion mane around his head.  His latest and by far my favorite look so far is his far out 70's inspired porkchop side burns.  My  mom saw him and said he looked like Captain Kangaroo.  I couldn't get a good shot of them with his ears standing up but trust me it's hilarious.

On a different note, since summer is in full swing my posts will be fewer.  We've been so busy and blogging has fallen down a little on the list.  I do have a quick and easy father's day project coming to share this week though so stayed tuned for that.  Also, I made a few design changes to the blog so if you're in google reader or blogger click on over and let me know what you think.