Sunday, July 21, 2013

The most ridiculously tiny but fabulous fabric box (and a slightly bigger one, too)

I saw a tutorial for a cute little fabric box and just had to make it.  It's hilariously small -- only two inches tall and three inches square from above.




For future reference: to get one this size, I started out with an eight inch square and made inch and a half triangles for the corners.  I used good old felt instead of proper batting, and it worked perfectly.  If I made one a whole lot bigger, I might add some Craft Fuse (Pellon 808) to one or both of the fabrics, but then sewing on the buttons might be a nightmare.  I might just hot glue those puppies on in that case.  For this one, hand sewing on those freaking buttons and hand sewing (GASP!) to tack down the inside corners took longer than sewing the entire rest of the project.  Hence, the reason I hate hand sewing.  I'm always poking myself with the needle and making myself bleed, too.  I loved sewing this little box anyway.

Here is the second one I made just now -- it started with a 12" square and used a 2.5" triangle for the corners, and it ended up being 3" tall and 4.5" square.  I eschewed the hand sewing in favor of hot glue.  I also decided to forego the buttons to make the box look a little less country.  I also added in one of my labels that my mother-on-law gave me for my birthday.  I'm still planning on making Roonie Rancher labels for me and Erin, but I need help picking a font.





Here is a photo of the two of them together.  Amazing how a 4" larger square didn't increase the overall size of the box by much.  Now I kinda want to experiment with some even bigger squares!  I didn't put any Craft Fuse in this box, because the polyester I used on the outside is fairly stiff.  If I had used two quilting cottons, some interfacing might have been a good idea.  The hot glue for the flaps (both the inside ones and the outside ones) worked great.  I didn't like the placement of two of the outside flaps and was able to rip them back open and reglue them into place -- not something I would have been willing to do if I had hand-sewn then wonky.

3 comments:

  1. Hello,
    thank you for the detailed descriptions, especially the tip about using felt! Beatrice.

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  2. Hi there,, I saw your post at Seaside Stitches for this fabric box,, too darn cute,, I have five daughters and seven granddaughters, what a great Christmas gift these would be!! I thought about using 14" & 16" squares w/some interfacing and batting, my issue would be how to calculate the corner's measurements..any suggestions?? please email me if you have an answer to my issue.. LJeterpudd@aol.com,, Subject: FABRIC BOX thanks sew much, and Happy Holidays to you and yours!

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  3. Here is what I follow 8 inch 1 1/2" corners,, 10 inch 2 inch corners , 12 inch fabric means 2.5 inch corners and so forth

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