Which of course means teacher presents – and I sort of forgot for a minute that I now have two children at primary school, which meant twice the number of presents…So, 2 Teachers and 2 TAs, plus a leaving present for pre-school as my youngest says goodbye to them. The pre-school was easy though, as Robin regularly wore her butterfly costume to school where it was greatly admired, so I made another one for pre-school. (I “slightly” overestimated how much fleece I would need first time around, so had plenty on hand!)
Traditionally I have made reversible totes for Matthew’s teachers (well, TAs really, as until this year he hasn’t had a teacher last out the year), which as they were all ladies worked well, but this year I had the challenge of a male teacher (couldn’t picture him with one of my bags…) But he is a tie-wearer, so courtesy of the free pattern at Coletterie I had a go (with some more of the linen from Cathy’s wedding).
The bags came together very nicely. As usual each bag is lined in a sturdy fabric to reinforce the decorative side, with a large pocket from the contrast fabric on it. In this case the blue and green bags had a calico lining, while the fern pattern fabric was paired with dark heavyweight denim. (Of course, the whole bag can be reversed so that the plain/pocketed side is on the outside, and the more decorative side tucked away discreetly inside the bag.) I even remember to sew tag in before stitching the side seams, and put the handles and ties in the right way round FIRST TIME!!
The tie was straightforward, but, unless I misinterpreted the instructions for folding, came up far too wide around the neck, so I ended up tracing some changes onto the lining from one of Robert’s ties, trimming it down and refolding everything. Came together beautifully the second time around, which isn’t bad for a first time make. And I think we had four happy teachers (the tie was even being worn by the end of the day).
