Hair Clip Tidy Tutorial

I designed this Hair Clip Tidy for my daughter so she could hang it in her bedroom and keep her hair clips in one place and off the floor! We use it ALL the time and they make great little birthday gifts for all her friends.

You can also thread Alice Bands through the bottom loop. I also sometimes make them with a popper fastening at the bottom so you can keep hair bands tidy too. 

We have even made a You Tube video to show you how to make one. You can find it on the Sew Scrumptious You Tube Channel.


 
You Will Need: 

2 FQ's of cotton fabric.
We use a selection from the Sew Scrumptious Website
Stuffing
Thin ribbon approx 20cm long
Wide ribbon approx 64cm long
Button

To Make:

The first step is to make a template from some old cardboard. A cereal packet is perfect or you can download a pattern for FREE on the Sew Scrumptious website. I make mine 14cm x 14cm. You can make them bigger or smaller though.

Choose 2 fabrics for your hair clip tidy. I tend to use a vibrant patterned fabric on the front with a co-ordinating gingham or spotty fabric on the back but again its up to you. Draw around your template on each fabric and cut them out so your have 2 squares of fabric.

At this point I find it helpful to measure and fold over a quarter inch of fabric at the top of both pieces of fabric. Fold the patterned side over to the wrong side of the fabric. This makes sewing up the top easier later on as you will see!

Cut the ribbon you would like to use. The length is completely up to you. I generally use around 64cm. Find the middle of your top fabric square and place the ribbon face down on the patterned side of the fabric with the longer end of the ribbon overhanging the top edge.  Leave a small bit of ribbon overhanging at the other end.

Place the back fabric face down over the patterned fabric and pin down one side along the bottom and up the other side. The top should be left open at this stage.  You will need to pull up the fold you ironed earlier and sew right to the top of the fabric making sure you do a reinforcing stitch (stitch backward and forward) at each end. Use a quarter inch seam allowance.

Use pinking shears to trim the edges to prevent fraying and clip the bottom corners.

Turn inside out and press. It should look like this. The top edge should fold in easily along the lines that you pressed earlier so fold it back down

Stuff until you have a nice shape. Not too full just enough to give it a bit of body.

Pin along the top. The pressed edges should give you a nice straight seam which matches up perfectly. You will need to add a short length of ribbon to hang the hair clip tidy. Around 20cm is good. When you pin along the top edge place each end of the ribbon about 1/2 inch from the side edges. Sew all along the top of the tidy. This can be a bit fiddly.

Make sure you enclose the ribbon by sewing as close to the edge as you can. You may want to finish off the threads at each end by hand sewing at the back to ensure it is neat and secure.

You have nearly finished! At the bottom of the ribbon make a loop. This can be any size you like.

Sew a button to keep the loop in place to complete the end of the ribbon nicely

Voila your finished Hair Clip Tidy. You just need to add some pretty hair clips!

Gorgeous!

You can make so many different versions depending on your fabric.

Use quirky buttons to finish them off

You can also make a Hair Clip Tidy using a plain fabric and applique an initial on to the front to make an extra special present or makes different shapes using felt and fabric. These are a couple I made last year.

Dont forget to subscribe to the Sew Scrumptious You Tube Channel for lots of new tutorials and videos.

Felt Tip / Pencil Roll Tutorial

We love pencil rolls in our house. They come everywhere with us. In the car, on holiday, to restaurants, on planes, to the doctors. Guaranteed to keep the children entertained (for a little while at least!). They are also perfect for giving as presents along with a pretty little notebook. You can make them to accommodate coloured pencils, crayons, felt tips or gel pens - whatever your child prefers. You just need to adjust the size a little bit. These are super special because I have also been able to use some of my lovely new Jane Means Ribbons to make them. Its lovely having a proper stash of ribbons of all different shades to use for projects like this. The ribbon ties make them look so pretty.

You will need
Two 10.5 inch x 6.5 inch pieces of fabric
One 10.5 inch x 4 inch piece of fabric
(See photos above for different fabric combinations)
25 inches Ribbon
10.5 inches Bias Binding
A set of felt tip pens/pencils/crayons (I used felt tips pens from Asda as they were only 33p!)

Pattern

The pattern template really depends on what size pens or pencils you are using as they all seem to be different lengths in my experience. The coloured pencil rolls I have made before are much too tall for felt tips and gel pens for example so I needed to make a new template.

To make a pattern template, I just found some thin cardboard. To measure the width, I counted how many pens I had and allowed 1 inch for each pen. My set has 10 pens so it was 10 inches. I added 1/4 inch on each side for the seam allowance so the total width for my template was 10.5 inches. To measure the height, I placed one of the pens on the card and gave it a little bit of space at the top and bottom and then also added on another 1/4 inch seam allowance for the top and bottom. In my case this worked out to be 6.5 inches so I cut out a rectangle shape measuring 10.5 x 6.5 inches.

I find it quite helpful to mark the seam allowance and inch spacings on the template in pen. You will see why later! You then need to make a template for the pocket that holds the pens. Its the same width as above but you just need to decide how deep you want it by deciding how much of the pens you want to show. I choose a height of 4 inches including a 1/4 inch seam allowance (you don't need a seam allowance for the top of the pocket as we are using bias binding). I know this all sounds very complicated but it really isn't! Once you have a template you can use it again and again if you use the same pens. See below for mine.

Cut out two large rectangle pieces of fabric and one pocket sized piece of fabric. You can use lots of different fabric combinations. You choose!

Cut a 10.5 inch piece of bias binding and 25 inches of ribbon

Sew the bias binding along the top of the pocket piece of fabric.

Pin the pocket to the right side of one of the rectangles of fabric.

This is where the one inch marks on your template come in handy! Use it as a guide to pin along the bottom of the two bits of fabric. Place a pin every inch. This is to guide where you will be sewing up and down to make the individual pockets. Its worth putting some pins along the top of the pocket too to keep it in place. Its helpful to have the seam allowance marked on your template. You don't need to pin or sew the seam allowance at this point.

Starting at the left hand side, sew along very close to the bottom of the pocket. At your first pin, turn and  sew up to the top of the pocket, turn and sew back down over the same line. This helps reinforce the pocket. When you get to the bottom, turn and continue along the bottom until the next pin and do the same all the way along. Remember you DON'T need to sew the two edges as these will be sewn at a later stage.

See now you have individual little pockets. Cute!

Fold your ribbon in half and place facing inwards on top of the bias binding on the right hand side. Leave a small amount hanging over the edge.

Place the remaining piece of fabric face down over the pocket and pin all around the edge of the rectangles remembering to secure the ribbon (tuck the remaining ribbon away from the edges so it doesn't get caught up). Remember to leave a gap large enough to turn it through later. Make sure this is in the top half of the rectangle ABOVE the pocket. Sew all around the edge using a 1/4 inch seam allowance. Clip the top corners.

Turn inside out, make sure the corners are neat and carefully press. Make sure that the opening is neatly folded under and pressed. We can close this when we top stitch around the edge. Top stitch all the way around as close to the edge as you can go to finish. Be careful as you don't want to make the 2 end pockets too small for the pens!

Add felt tips and admire your handiwork!

I hope this makes sense! Please let me know if you make any pen rolls from this tutorial and I will feature them on my blog. Good luck (you may need it!).