TUTORIAL: how to fold and store your fabric yards using comic book boards

I store my fabric (one yard or more) in an IKEA billy bookcase.  This is their tall version with glass doors, which comes with adjustable shelves as well.

I use acid-free archival-safe comic book boards to fold my fabric around instead of those expensive plastic boards sold by big quilt stores. They do not ruin your fabric and are easy to find.  You can even write on them with pencil crayon, cover by scotch tape, to identify your fabric, its price, and place of purchase.

They come in packages of 100 and I get them here in Canada for around $6 cad.  I use 2 boards for each kind of fabric.

I don't like my fabric wrinkly or inaccessible and so this is my perfect solution.  I also like to be able to quickly count my multiple yards and so this tutorial will show you how to do that, easily keeping track of your glorious yardage :)

ok, so I will demonstrate using some Amy Butler Coriander in pink, of which I have 4.75 yards left; this tutorial works with any piece of fabric 1 yard or more (I even have a 15 yard bundle folded this way).  I fold my FQs or smaller, on a different shelf.

First, I take my LONG piece and fold it SELVAGE to SELVAGE, pressing it smooth, so there will be no wrinkles.

I line one end up with the edge of my OLFA cutting board and let the rest hang off onto my semi-clean floor. :)

so it is lined up with the end of my cutting board and then folded over; this piece of fabric is exactly 1 yard!!

then I take the LONG end hanging over the edge, and fold it over pressing at the left end, like an accordion.

here you can see where the left side is lined up; now bring it over to where you started and continue doing this for each end.

don't forget to smooth out the wrinkles and try to be as accurate as you can measuring out your yard lengths.

just keep folding over back and forth until you are done.

now since this piece was 4.75 yards, my last yard didn't quite make it, but this makes that last yard easy to count in a hurry, just by opening this up.

you can see here that I have 4 full yards and that top one.

here is the close up of how to count your yards...

the opposite end, furthest away from me, is all the selvages

I then take the top part and fold it over in half

I do it this way because I am really picky and don't want to see the selvages and this way they are hidden in the inside fold

your fabric should now look like this

now take one comic book board and bring it in about 4 inches

fold the end of the fabric over it

roll the fabric in on itself making it kind of tight, but not enough to bend the boards

perfect, now leave this side

now to work on the other end.  

put down the comic book board about an inch away from the fold... 

then flip it over; basically you are eyeball measuring how far you need to be away from the other fold to really line it all up.

now that you are 1 board away from the middle, fold about 4 inches of fabric around that end

and fold that over again towards the middle

now VOILA! you have a perfect, rigid, fabric "book" that you can shelve into your bookcase.

and file this puppy away; unwrinkled, easy to count, and gorgeous to look at :)

as you can see, now that you know that fabric is almost 5 yards, you can pretty easily count your whole stash at a glance, knowing what you should buy...

who am I kidding, you ALWAYS need more fabric!!!

hope this helps and feel free to leave a comment, thanks :)

TUTORIAL; how to sew a zipper pocket into the lining of a purse

This is the way I put zipper pockets in my bags; this method can be used for interior or exterior pockets and with zippers of any length.

 **I have recently seen the zippers temporarily attached with scotch tape, so I will try that method today and add my results as a amendment to this tutorial.

This TUTORIAL is done using the following ingredients:
-a 8" YKK zipper (my preferred brand)
-bag lining fabric
-8" by 12" pocket lining fabric
-small scissors
-rotary cutter (scissors are fine too)
-double-sided tape or glue stick (or neither if you do it my way)
-sewing machine
-thread
-zipper foot

for most of my medium bags, I use an 8" zipper. Some tutorials I've seen say to use 2 pieces for the pocket, but I find one long piece of fabric double the length of the pocket folded in half, is much stronger for the abuse it will take at the bottom of the pocket. this piece of red fabric is 8" by 12", so the finished pocket will be 8" by 6" minus seams.
Lay your red pocket right side down onto the lining which is right side up, so right sides together!!!

also, IF your pocket has a pattern with an up/down direction, then place the pocket with the bottom of your pocket print at the top of the lining.

I then make a line 1" from the top of the pocket, and stop a 1/2" before I get to the side of the pocket.

the line should look this and you would use the same formula not matter long of a zipper you happened to be using.

I then make a line parallel to this line, I made this one 3/4" away, but I sometimes make it just 1/2" for a neater look as less of the zipper will show.

join the ends and make a line down the centre (your future cut line), but don't go all the way to the ends, rather, stop short and add this pretty triangle 

sew on the outside box lines; I sew at a 2.4 stitch length, pivoting carefully at the corners and set your machine to keep the needle DOWN when it stops, otherwise it will look sloppy.

sew to the corner

lift the presser foot, pivot the fabric, all done with the needle in the down position

lower the presser foot again and continue. If you had set it to 2.4 Stitch length and 3/4 width, then it should be exactly 4 stitches from corner to corner...

pivot again at the next corner

this will be your finished box

this will be your finished box

carefully cut by scissors or rotary along the centre line ONLY, BUT do not snip the lines you just sewed; if you do, don't freak out, but do sew them again.

this is how the long cut should look, notice it does NOT go right to the end!!

now CAREFULLY snip into the corners, as close as you can, without snipping the corner stitches

this is what it should now look like; I pulled the triangles up a bit, so you could see better

now put the red pocket through the hole you just sewed and it should look like this...

the view from the underside/back

this is the trickiest part; you need to smooth out this area in preparation for sewing the zipper to it. This is where you make it look sloppy or not. I use my fingers and the iron as well to get nice corners.

iron from the top first as this is the side you'll be seeing, but also iron the back to keep it under control.

I put a lot of effort into getting this corner pointy, pulling on the red from the bottom can also help while ironing the top. Fiddle around until it looks good to you.

this looks ready for the zipper; sometimes, like this pocket, I hide the pocket lining, other times, I let the lining peek through a bit adding visual interest... just a preference either way :)

the next step involves sticking the zipper to the pocket while you sew. I don't actually do this anymore and just skip it (holding in place while I sew), but I used to use adhesive tape (you can even use a glue stick).

**I have recently seen a tutorial using scotch tape to hold in place, so I will be trying this method ASAP!

sew the end with the pull closed to keep it together as you'll need to have the zipper 1/2 open to do the next part

on the inside of the pocket, iron the double-sided tape, sticky side down to the edges of the hole

do this on all sides, remove the backing and you should be left with a sticky border around the hole

again, carefully iron the zipper to the sticky tape residue holding it for sewing.

I like to line up this end with the zipper stop, for 2 reasons:

1. so I don't sew over this metal breaking my needle!

2. it just looks neater and the zipper won't disappear behind the lining.

don't forget to iron the bottom to really get it stuck there

you can even pin it and sew it... this is purely preference.

I am right-handed, so I put the zipper pull on the left of all my zippers, as that makes it more comfortable to open. Ned Flanders would probably want it the other way 

it should look like this after ironing and setting in place, keep the zipper 1/2 open, this keeps the pull out of the way

Use your zipper foot for this next part.

I start sewing on the long bottom edge, so my starting point won't be seen as you will want to go over this point a few times. Don't try to start at a corner, it will not look as pretty.

I top-stitch this with a stitch length of 3.0 or 3.2 with coordinating thread. Longer stitching looks more professional.

Sometimes, I even go around the box twice, a 1/4" around the outside of this box. again, your preference

getting by the zipper foot is a little tricky.

Simultaneously, life the presser foot and push and pull the zipper pull under your foot, keeping the needle in the fabric. You MUST have your machine set to having the needle in the down position for this; I actually ONLY sew this way and it makes for smoother stitches when pivoting, turning etc.

 just slide it under and right by

notice the needle is still in the DOWN position, that way there is no shifting of the fabric underneath

again, pivot at the corners carefully

this should be how it looks

*this is a little sloppy for my square as I don't usually use fusible tape, but I did for this tutorial

now, cut the zipper ends off in line with the pocket edges

now fold over the bottom part of the pocket to the top and line them up into a neat rectangle

you are going to sew or serge around the three sides closing the pocket.  Start in the top right corner as pictured here.

DO NOT sew the lining (blue) to the pocket (red), just sew the pocket (red) together, keeping the lining (blue) out of the way as you pivot.

you can pin it if you want, I don't... I just pinned here to show you 

serging it closed

sew all around the 3 open edges of the pocket

you don't need to sew this bottom edge as it's already closed by the folded over fabric.

this is what the back will look like when the sides are sewn or serged 

your new pocket!!!

Now, you can use your bag lining as your pattern suggests.