I made a wristlet!

I have a favorite clutch that I carry everywhere. It has beaded owls on it. But being tossed in my backpack on school days can be brutal. So I decided to make a cute backpack-safe wristlet! And here it is…

Unfortunately though WordPress isn’t letting me upload most of my how-to pics… grr… Sorry about that! (For now, see them here.) But essentially here’s what I did…

I took 4 rectangles of fabric – 2 in the paisley pattern and 2 in denim. To make each side, I pinned one denim and one paisley together – back to back. I then sewed long, spaced out stitches (no back stitches!) about a 1/2 inch above what I wanted to be the bottom of the clutch. I did this on each fabric pair. Leave long threads at each end.

I pulled the ends of the threads to make it gather.

Then I sewed the two pairs together – paisley sides out, denim in – along the gathered seam.

Then I pinned the sides. On one side I included a long piece of fabric, which was about 1/2 inch wide, folded, and sewn along the edge. The ends to this long strip were pinned in on side seam of the clutch to make a wristlet strap.

I then sewed two straight lines, one along each seam.

Along the top, I tucked the paisley and denim fabrics inward towards each other and sewed the two top edges to the wristlet, allowing for the opening.

Lastly, I added a zipper. Since I was stuck inside from the snow, I reused a zipper that had been on a Bible cover in our giveaway pile. And that worked great! On the back end, I did sew the zipper shut. But other than that, it cut well and did not fray. To put the zipper in, I zipped it together and then pinned it inside just below the top edges. Once it was pinned in place, I unzipped it and sewed! I did not find it too difficult to put in.

Sorry for the lack of pics, but if you check out my Shutterfly page, you should be able to piece the how-to together with the help of these instructions!

I’m linking up…