The Lady Beekeeper

So the other day I noticed I had a pack of 10 badge holders in my Amazon shopping cart.  Weird.  I didn’t remember putting them there.  I thought I must have had them in there from DanyCon since I was toying around with the idea of making everyone lanyards and badges, but knew I had purchased things since then.  I promptly deleted them because clearly I was going crazy.

The next day Will was complaining about how often he has to replace the little plastic thing holding his work badge.  Ah.  Will was the culprit.  He said those were the “sturdiest” holders he could find (though they really didn’t look particularly sturdy).  That made me think back to when I was at college.  In school I carried my student ID around everywhere with me on a lanyard.  That ID holder was made of leather and was super durable.  I never had to replace it once in 4 years.  That got my thinking, “I could make that”…

Yesterday at the summer house an inner tube popped so I asked my dad for part of the plastic as he was tossing it in the trash.  He probably thought I was crazy because he said something like “you can have the whole thing if you really want it…”  The plastic is perfect for the see-through window on the badge holder, and was thick enough to sew through without ripping!  Plus I saved a few inches of plastic from the landfill… and was able to use up some scrap fabric and interfacing!  Here’s how to make your own!

DIY Badge/ID Holder

What you need:

• 1 square foot of fabric
• a small rectangle of thick malleable plastic (less than 6×4″)
• a small rectangle of Peltex Pellon 70 ultra firm stabilizer (less than 6×4″)
• a small rectangle of medium weight fusible interfacing (less than 6×4″)
• a 1/2″ diameter plastic ring (like the ones used for roman shades)
• 1 snap

1. Cut a 4″ x 2 5/16″ rectangle of pellon 70 and a 6 1/2 x 5″ rectangle of fabric.
   

   Cut peltex and fabric

2. Fold the width-wise edges of the fabric up the sides of the interfacing.  My trick with interfacing is that instead of using pins, which are difficult to use with such thick interfacing, I use tiny binder clips.  They save so much time!
   

   Hold interfacing and fabric with binder clips for easy sewing.

3. Press.
   

   Press

4. Fold the fabric up around the interfacing & clip
   

   Fold fabric up

5. Press.
   

   Press

6. Fold the ugly (side you’ll put on the inside) edge of the fabric up over the top of the interfacing.
   

   Wrap “bad” side of fabric around interfacing.

7. Fold in the edges like you would an envelope so the fabric will not show.
   

   Fold in edges so they will not show.

8. Press.
   

   Press

9. Fold the good side of the fabric over onto the bad side of the badge (this will be hidden when we attach the front).
   

   Fold “good” side of fabric over “bad” side of fabric.

10. Stitch all around the outside, close to the edge.  This is the back of your badge holder.
    

    Stitch 1/8″ from the edge.

11. Take the back of your badge holder and trace around this on a piece of fusible interfacing.  Cut out the interfacing a mm or so larger than the traced rectangle.
    

    Trace badge holder back onto interfacing, cut slightly larger than this.

12. Cut out a square of fabric 1/2″ larger than the rectangle in every direction.
13. Measure 1/2″ up from the interfacing on each side and draw lines forming a frame.
    

    Draw a 1/2″ frame on interfacing.

14. Cut a “v” in the interfacing from one corner of the inside rectangle to the adjacent corner.
    

    Cut “v”s up to the frame on both sides.

15. Following manufacturer’s instructions, fuse interfacing to fabric.
    

    Fuse interfacing to fabric

16. Cut your “v” shapes from step 14 into the fabric taking care not to cut further than the interfacing.
    

    Cut “v”s into fabric

17. Fold and press the sides, forming mitered edges (see instructions in this post).  Trim the fabric so it comes just to the edge of the “frame” you drew in step 13.
    

    Fold and press up sides, forming mitered corners

18. Fold the inner pieces outwards, press, trim to slightly smaller than the outside of the rectangle and binder clip.
    

    Fold inner pieces out, forming a frame.

19. Repeat for all 4 sides.
    

    Trim and clip then repeat for all 4 sides.

20. Sew 1/8″ from the center of the frame, all around the face of the badge holder.
    

    Stitch 1/8″ from the inside of the frame.

21. Cut a piece of plastic slightly smaller than the width of the “frame”.
    

    Cut a piece of plastic smaller than the frame.

22. Center the plastic on the back of the frame, place a piece of waxed paper over it (this will prevent the plastic from sticking to your presser foot) and binder clip.
    

    Add waxed paper over the plastic to prevent it from sticking.

23. Stitch 1/8″ from the outside of the “frame” all around.
    

    Stitch 1/8″ from the outside edge of the frame.

24. Remove the waxed paper by tearing.
    

    Tear off waxed paper.

25. Add a plastic ring to the back piece by stitching back and forth over the ring.
    

    Attach ring

26. Place the frame of your badge holder over the wrong side of your badge holder back.
27. Stitch on top of the outer stitching, taking care to leave the top side opened (so you can put your badge in).
28. Add a snap at the top of the badge holder between the top edge of the “frame” and the back.
    

    Add snap

29. Enjoy!
    

    Looks especially great on a mannequin wearing a long black cloak as shown here.

So I accidentally ate KFC today.  Well not accidentally, it was pre-meditated.  I did walk in and purchase it before I ate it.  I even had a rousing conversation with the guy at the counter about my favorite types of Mountain Dew.  Anyway, never again.  (That’s what I say every time.)

I was going some where with this… oh yeah!  So its not all that bad because I did yoga today at lunch, and that might counteract some of the terribleness of eating that delicious chicken deep fried in lard.  Maybe.

Yesterday I had an epiphany about yoga.  If you’ve read my other blog posts, you’ll notice that I attempted to start meditating to relieve the horrible tension headaches I was getting during my last project at work.  The problem with meditation is that you have to just sit there and do nothing.  I mean, I know that’s the whole point, don’t get me wrong.  If you’ve met me, you’ll know I can’t just sit in once place and do nothing.  Frankly I will go one step further and say it kills me to not multitask.  Well yoga fixes that!  I am focusing on my breath while mindfully moving (doing exercise)!  It is the perfect combination of relaxation+exercise multitasking that a type A person like myself would enjoy.  And did I mention I can touch my toes now?!  I’m all in.

Yoga has lots of “stuff” that you can buy to go along with it, but aside from some pants that you won’t moon anyone in a mat is really all you need.  I now own two mats, one for home and one that I keep at work.  Recently my best buddy has been lamenting her yoga mat bag’s functionality because the mat sticks to the sides when she tries to insert it.  That got me to thinking.  Below is a “bag” pattern to hold your yoga mat!

The circumference of my mat at home is 15″.  The mat is 5mm thick, so this is pretty large.  You can change the size slightly to accommodate your mat, though using long strips of velcro allows you to adjust the size considerably.

Yoga Mat Carrier

What you’ll need:

• ~1/2 yard of scrap fabric (I used some leftover from the curtains in our lounge)
• 2.5 yards of 1″ thick nylon heavy webbing
• 1 foot of velcro
• thread to match

1. Cut a 22×16″ rectangle of your fabric.
2. Press the sides under 1/2″ then under 1/2″ again.
   

   Fold edges under and press

3. Fold out the corners.  Snip the corner off at the first intersection of your folds.
   

   Snip off corner at first intersection

4. Fold the rest of the corner over at the inner most intersection of your folds. Then fold the edges under 1/2″ and under 1/2″ again following the original folds.
   

   Mitered corners

5. Repeat for all 4 corners.  Pin & stitch
   

   Pin and stitch edges

6. Cut a 10×5.5″ rectangle of fabric for your pocket.  Press the top under 1/4″ and then under 1/4″ again.  Stitch.
   

   Fold under one side of the pocket.

7. Fold the sides in 1 1/4″.  Press & stitch 1/4″ from the unfinished edge.
   

   Fold sides in. (Check out my adorable ruler slap bracelet!)

8. Fold large rectangle for the bag in half to find the center.  Pin the unfinished edge of the pocket slightly above this line. Stitch.
   

   This picture is slightly wrong… You should have stitched the folded in sides so they shouldn’t be flopping around.

9. Pin the sides of the pocket and stitch (you may have to turn the pocket inside out to do this).
   

   Pin sides of pocket to bag.

10. Attach a 1″ piece of velcro to the pocket.
    

    Attach velcro to inside of pocket.

11. Attach a 3.5″ piece of velcro vertically to the edge of each side of the top of the “bag” on the the right side of the fabric.
12. Attach the other half of the 3.5″ piece of velcro on the edge of each side of the bottom of the “bag” on the wrong side of the fabric.
13. Take your nylon webbing and cut it in two equal length pieces.  Toast the edges slightly with a lighter to prevent fraying.
    

    Burn edges to prevent fraying

14. Once again fold fabric in half and pin one end of the webbing to one side at the fold.  Take the other end of the webbing and overlap the pinned end by an inch.  Replace your pin.  Make sure your strap is not twisted.  Repeat with other side.
    

    Attach handles to bag.  Note that I marked where to stop sewing with the perpendicular pins.

15. Stitch both straps on the edge from 2 inches below the velcro to 2 inches below the velcro on the other side.

Enjoy!

Go yoga.

To roll up your yoga mat lay the rectangle flat and put the yoga bag through the straps.  pull side with pocket up first around mat snuggly, then wrap the other side around securing to the velcro.  You can put your yoga strap in the front pocket!

Insert mat through straps

Roll rectangular section around mat, securing with velcro.

Now for the part you have been waiting for!  Thank you for the June contest entries… I will be contacting you in the coming week.  Our July give away is going to be centered around Pokemon… I’ll be giving away several hats similar to the one I made here (though they will be solid black with a pokeball).  If you’d like to enter, post a comment (by August 15th) with an answer to the following question – Is Lexi pulling off that red lipstick above? Just kidding, tell me your favorite Pokemon and why!  Bonus points if you can guess my favorite pokemon. :D  Bonus bonus points if you can guess my favorite flavor of Mountain Dew (Will you are disqualified from answering both of the bonus questions).

So all my free time right now is pretty much consumed by Pokemon Go.  I’m mostly joking, but in all honesty, Will & I have been going out every night to hit up Pokestops.  Super silly.  We went out to main street in Clinton at 10:30pm on Friday and there were at least 20 other people doing the exact same thing.   After departing a conversation with one of the other groups, we heard one of them remark “I never thought anything like this would happen in our lifetimes!”  Again very silly.  But seriously, if you played red or blue as a child this game was literally made for you.   You know you always wanted to catch pokemon in the real world.  And now you can!

As an example of how great it is, Saturday we went to my parent’s summerhouse and went out in the paddleboat to catch water pokemon.  Totally worked, look at a couple I caught…

Fishing for Pokemon on the Lake

A wild magikarp appeared!

A wild poliwag appeared!

Well given all the pokemania – I thought I would post something pokemon related.  I am fairly short on time (what with leveling up all my pokemon and becoming a pokemon master) so I decided to refashion a hat and add an embroidered pokeball to it.  I will never attempt to re-make a baseball cap again.  Everything was super easy except the brim.  I redid the brim about 45 times until I got something that even looked remotely okay.  The problem was in finishing the hat they had trimmed the excess material, making it impossible to stitch it back together properly.  Never again.

I’ll try to post the tutorial for re-doing a hat later this week in case anyone is adventurous, but for now here’s a free embroidery file of a pokeball for you to adorn everything with.  You’ll need to change the extension from .zip to .pes.  Though it is fully functional and looks great, it is really not a great example of elegant machine embroidery, so I’ll try to post a less teflon-tough version when pokemon mania subsides.

https://www.ladybeekeeper.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/pokemon.zip

Go Team Blue!

How to Refashion a Baseball Cap into a Pokemon Trainer Hat

What you need:

• embroidery machine and the embroidery file here (rename from .zip to .pes)
• red and white embroidery thread
• old baseball cap (I used a hat Will got from a friend’s wedding since Will doesn’t wear hats – I still have mine Matt & Maren ;) )
• thick white material (like canvas)
• recycled pattern paper
• white thread
• seam ripper

1. First you’ll need to disassemble the hat starting at the little button on top. I found that you could remove the two pieces of the button by using a screw driver.
   

   Pry off metal button

2. Begin removing the brim and front panel of the hat. This is all you’ll want to remove.  Make sure to keep the hat band intact when you remove the front panel and brim.  You’ll want to take pictures so you can remember how to put it all back together as it may be slightly different than my hat.
3. Take the front piece and lay it flat, tracing a pattern for your new front panel.
   

   Remove the front panel of the hat, trace for new pattern

4. Trace your pattern on the white canvas, leaving room for 1/2″ of seam allowance all around.
5. Using your embroidery machine and a 4×4″ hoop, stitch the pokeball in the center of your canvas panel, switching colors from red to white when prompted.
   

   Embroider pokeball on front panel

6. Cut out your pattern leaving 1/2″ seam allowance all around. Cut a slit at the top of the hat like the original panel.
   

   Cut out front panel

7. Overlap the two edges of the slit and stitch closed, forming a three dimensional panel for your forehead.
   

   Pin dart at front of hat

8. Pin each side of the panel to each side front of the hat, making sure to line up the point properly.
   

   Pin front panel

9. Sew each side.
   

   Stitch front panel

10. Top stitch slightly to the inside of where you just stitched on the front panel sides.
    

    Top stitch

11. Reattach the brim by pinning the brim right sides together to the outside of the front panel of the hat. This was the biggest challenge for me because I could not fit the brim between the feed dogs and the presser foot.
12. After I got it to sit as nice as possible, I made it look a bit better by top stitching along the edge of the brim and the front panel.
13. Finally reattach the button. (I just tapped the two pieces together with a hammer.)