Wallet Tutorial

This was a tutorial that Mrs. Sassy Crafter posted on her blog when I guess posted over there.  I was going to post it here too but I got busy and forgot.  So here it is for y'all to enjoy!  

I made a wallet like this for my mother a couple of months ago and a couple of people said they would like a tutorial on it.

 I got busy and kept pushing it back.  I am glad I got it done ( even if it took me a couple of months! )  Hope you enjoy.  If you have any questions, you can feel free to ask.  The wallet itself is just a simple wallet.  I decided to do the gathers on the front which idea I got from the blog Noodlehead.  Several other people have been doing the gathers like this on purses and thing but Noodlehead was where I actually learned how to do it.  If you go to her blog she has a tutorial on how she does it.  I will go through it on my tutorial too but there are some slight changes in the way she does it verses the way I do it ( but it is mostly the same ).

Your supplies:

1 strip of fabric that is 18 inches long by 5 1/2 inches wide

1 strip of fabric that is 9 inches long by 5 1/2 inches wide

2 strips of second print that is 10 inches long by 5 1/2 inches wide

then you need a strip of fabric that is at least 2 inches wide by 9 inches long ( this can vary depending on how wide you want your middle strap to be )

1 snap, button, or piece of velcro to close the wallet with

Now let's get started!  All of my seams are 1/4 of an inch. With our inside and outside piece you need to decided if you want your wallet to have a curve to it or if you want it to be a straight line.  I curved mine, but you can most certainly leave it straight.  I just did mine by sight but you can find something curved and trace it and cut it out. NOW we want to grab our piece of fabric that is 18 X 5 1/2 and find the center.  I did this by folding it in half length wise and then ironing it flat.  Open it back up and now you know where the middle is

 Next you want to sew a line down both sides of the middle that you just ironed.  Because I used black fabric, I decided to iron it to know where the middle was but you can just as easily mark it with a pencil or something that will wash off. 

Before you sew you want to bump up your width on your sewing machine to a high number.  Mine only goes up to 5 so I bumped the width and length up to 5 on both!

Make sure you sew each line as it's own and don't continue the line from one side to the other.  Also, we are going to gather the material so you want to keep the thread long when you cut it off.  This helps out a lot when trying to gather it.

Once both sides are sew close to the middle you will need to take the top thread on both sides and gather the material by pulling on it.  If you have never done this before, it is pretty easy and kinda fun!  You want to gather both sides up as even as possible and you want to make sure that it ends up being the same length as your other piece of 9 X 5 1/2 fabric

Now you want to iron this piece flat and put it off to the side and pick up that coordinating fabric that is 9 X 2 inches for the center piece.  Now there are two ways to do this part.  You can put the fabric right sides together and sew the raw edge together.  Then you turn it right side out and you have your strip.  I decided to take the sides and turn them into the center of my fabric like I was making bias tape and iron it flat.

there is no wrong or right way but I choose to do this because I thought it would work better for the wallet later when adding my snap closure.  Take the strip and pin it over the top of the gathered fabric to hide all the thread.

Sew along both sides to finish this top piece off only DON'T FORGET to change your length and width back to whatever you normally sew things on

Now put that off to the side and let's work on the inside of the wallet.  I want you to pick up the coordinating pieces that are going to be the pockets for your credit cards.  Take each piece of the 10 X 5 1/2 fabric and fold them right sides together and pin them.

Sew the raw edge closed and then turn right side out.  Once you do this you want to take the fabric and fold it in half but do it to where one side is folded less then the other creating the credit card slots.

Iron these flat to get them to stay better

Now we want to make sure we place these credit card slots in the right place.  Take your ungathered piece of 9 X 5 1/2 inch fabric and place the bottom credit card pocket about an inch from the bottom 

Then I want you to take the second pocket and place it 1/2 an inch above the bottom one.

This is where it gets slightly confusing.  I want you to open up the bottom pocket WITHOUT moving it's placement and then pin the middle down.  I was nervous about sewing this wrong so I made a line with pencil down the center of my fabric where I was to sew.

Sew down the center of the pocket which will sew it to the 9 X 5 1/2 inch piece.  Do the same with the other pocket making sure to keep it's placement 1/2inch above the other pocket.  If you pick up your fabric piece it should look something like this

Now fold those back in half and iron it all flat. It should start looking like a wallet now...if it doesn't, I lost you some where which is VERY possible!  haha  But hopefully y'all are with me still.  ( I can still say y'all even though I moved out of Texas right? )

Now you may think you are ready to sew it all together but you would be wrong.  First before we do that we need to make some kind of closure for our wallet.  I did a snap because I like those on wallets.  The first time I made one of these I did velcro and that works fine too.  You can also just use a button although I am not a BIG fan of doing button wholes.  So choose your poison.  We need to make sure we place everything in the right place and try and get it all lined up as much as possible.   Here is a picture of the first snap and its placement

Notice that this is on the inside of the wallet where the credit card pockets go.  I found my middle which is a little less then 3 inches from the side.  Next we need to go down about 1 inch from the top.

This is where we want our snap/velcro/button to go. Make sure you do whatever you need to do to get which ever of the three you picked to stay secure to your fabric.

now we want to do the other end of the closure. Take the outside of the fabric and find where it needs to go

About 2 inches up from the bottom right in our center ( which we know from before was just a little less then 3 inches.  Secure it to the fabric.  If you choose a snap I am warning you the fabric here is really thick because you are going through a couple of thicknesses.  Make sure you get everything lined up right.  It took me about ten whole minutes to get the snap right on this side.   Once you have the closure done we are ready to sew it all together!  WOO HOO.  Take right sides of the fabric and pin them together.  We are gonna sew all the way around except at the bottom.  We are leaving that opened so we can turn the wallet right side out.

 Also, here is a little word of advice.  I would pin the fabric and sew on the side where the ruffles are.  If you don't, you might not catch all of the gathers and that would be really sad.  Trust me because I have done it before!  

 Sew all the way around making sure you catch all the ruffles but leave that bottom open.  Turn it right side out.  Isn't it cute?  I usually check to make sure the closure is matching up and working.  If everything looks good and you are done we just tuck under that bottom part we left open.

 Now once you have that tucked under and pinned you need to sew all the way around the wallet closing the bottom and making a decorative stitch all the way around.  NOW, you are done! Now you can either leave it like it is or try adding something to the flap.

ENJOY your wallet.  I do not need this one so I am thinking of adding it to my etsy shop that will HOPEFULLY be open for business this weekend.  Cross your fingers for me!    Note to self:  Do NOT Use plain black fabric while making another tutorial.  Too hard to see whats going on!  haha