Mckayla’s elective this year is photography. I love all of the last minute surprises.
Oh, Mom there’s a $40 Photography fee.
Me: Of course there is.
Oh, Mom, I need a film camera for photography class.
Me: What? Do they even sell film camera’s anymore?
Thankfully, Dave doesn’t get rid of anything and still had his camera.
***
At 5pm, right before a large cubscout parent meeting being held at our house:
Oh, mom. I need a camera bag. By tomorrow.
Me: How about that one in the closet?
Mom! That’s MASSIVE!!! I need something smaller.
Me: Of course you do. I guess I could make you one.
That would be wonderful!
So I cannibalized the massive camera bag. I took all of the foam insert pieces out and rearranged them into the smallest configuration possible to fit the camera. I sewed a slip cover for it and then asked Mckayla if she’d like the actual bag out of felt or material.
Her: Definitely felt! Can you put something cool on it? How about a camera?
The wonderful thing about felt is that you don’t have to do all of my least favorite things about sewing like hemming and ironing. I found a simple canvas bag and used its general construction as a pattern. I measured and cut and sewed and then, because I obviously can’t measure or cut accurately, did the whole thing over again.
When I was finally done with the purse, I added a long handle so that Mckayla could wear it like a messenger bag. If you look real close, squint your eyes and tilt your head sideways, you can see the whale decorative stitch I used. I’m a little bit worried about the felt holding up to the abuse of a teenager, so all the seams are double reinforced and the whale stitch did just the job.
The final step was constructing the flap of the bag. I cut and recut the flap a few cetnimeters at a time, maybe a dozen times until I was satisfied. I thought about using velcro, but settled on a button. I went through my grandma’s button box until I found the perfect size and shape button. I sewed the button on, cut a whole in the felt and called it done.
Then I went to town decorating the front. McKayla and I poured over the internet until she found something she liked. Dave had the ingenious idea to leave the top portion of the camera decal unattached in order to make a small pocket to carry film. Sometime around 1 am I finished it.
Mckayla: This is so awesome!!!! All the other kids are going to have store bought cases and I’m gonna come to school with this! They’re going to be so jealous! I’ll tell them that could have one too for $20. You could have a nice little side business, selling kindle covers and camera bags.
Me: What?!
Her: Okay, what do you want $25?
Me: That would make my labor something like $4 an hour. That seems totally worth it. I’m only making this one. Consider my camera bag making days are over. I’m retiring.
Overactiveovaries 