Mesh Wet Bag Tutorial Part I

Let's play catch-up!

I'm mourning the end of summer. I know a lot of people who love the coolness of fall - and I do, too - but I miss the consistency of summer. I liked being able to stay in exactly the same outfit the entire day, without putting on or taking off any layers. I liked being able to leave bread dough out in my locked car to rise. I liked being able to nip out just before bedtime to run a quick errand in the (still) bright sunshine. I liked the pool and the catharsis of falling asleep on a deckchair with my notebook on my sunscreened belly. I liked the feeling of having all the kids with me, ready to go on adventures together - the zoo, the Science Museum, a park, a new eatery for our weekly teas. I liked how it reminded me of home in Singapore, where -sometimes regrettably - every day was summer.

But I also like that my kids are in school now, being stimulated and challenged in ways that were by definition completely antagonistic with the ways of summer. I like that they're back with their old friends and making new ones, sitting under the tutelage of a variety of teachers. And I like that I have my mornings to myself, even if briefly, until little Kate steps off the schoolbus and torpedoes straight into my arms, hungry for lunch and excited to be home.

That's where I am now - the beginning of the school year, settling into my new routine of early mornings and falling temperatures. I don't feel like sewing. Or reading. Or cleaning house. Or redecorating. Or visiting with people. Or writing. Or blogging. Or websurfing. Or shopping. Or anything, really. Although - I must confess that I am slightly thrilled about fall fashion. It is so much more fun to sew clothes for fall - they're smarter, the fabrics are richer and drape better about the body, the lines are cleaner and people feel generally more put-together than in the carefree, anything-goes summer season. I might finally dig out my wools and sew myself a few more bias-cut Alines. I've needed them for yonks. Also another basic denim skirt. And that Chinese blouse with frogs. I have all these small project tubs, each filled with the fabric, lining, zipper, paper pattern - all drafted and ready to lay out. Some of these tubs were prepared months (or years) back. Then I lost interest because garmentmaking is sooooooo boring compared to playing or swimming or designing a new toy. Then I tell myself that I can't always be crafting-sewing; sometimes I have to balance it out with tailoring-sewing. Even if I have to force myself to do it. It's all about balance, right? Or finishing WIPs. Whatever.

Well. Enough of me. You came for a tutorial that I'd promised from weeks ago, right?

To make those bags with the round, piped bases

in rainbow colors?

Here we go, then.

I'm going to start out with a reality check. This is not a bag for beginning bag-seamstresses. Let me clarify: the design is easy. And were it made of cotton/homedec/canvas fabric (with or without copious amounts of interfacing), beginning bag-seamstresses would probably enjoy it, even with the circular base and piping. However, the combination of waterproof and synthetic materials of which this particular wet bag is made will be challenging to even intermediate bag-seamstresses. For starters, you need to be willing to

• work with cargo netting, which is fluid and moves a lot and stretches in all directions and changes dimensions as you sew
• not pin anything at all and instead ease materials together by hand as they go under the presser foot
• be prepared not to unpick anything or rip any seams when sewing on webbing, because it is almost impossible to see coordinating-color stitches against the weave of the webbing. This means you must sew it right the first time
• use brute force when working with the rigid piping and simultaneously unyielding and slippery ripstop nylon
• deal with insane fraying (yes, ripstop nylon and webbing fray)
• not iron or press any seams to hold them in place
• finish every single seam without a serger i.e. the old-fashioned way of flat-felling or binding.

If, however, you are bored of sewing bags in regular cloth fabric and lining layers and interfacing, maybe this will be an interesting change, if nothing else, because of the unusual materials used. In addition to the cargo netting and ripstop nylon, you'll be working with polyester webbing, grommets, nylon cord, vinyl tubing, electrical tape and - snort! - a toothpick and a candle.

And now, if you're ready for an adventure, let's get started! I'm going to do this tutorial in two parts. The first part contains the cutting plan and tips on working with these somewhat unusual materials. The second part contains the actual step-by-steps.

Begin by downloading the schematic diagram and cutting plan:

CLICK HERE to download.

Here follow some notes on the materials used. These were chosen because they were either water-resistant or held up well upon getting wet.


1  Cargo Netting
This is what cargo netting looks like (the black thing in the photo below). 

It's not quite the same as laundry bag fabric or athletic mesh (what holey basketball tank-tees are made of), which also has holes but feels like stretchy jersey fabric. Cargo netting has no "fabric" to speak of: it's like a net of holes held together by strands. The holes are roundish, have no warp/weft (so to speak) direction and no discernible RS/WS. 

I bought mine at Joann here. Look for it in the utility fabric section (not the apparel/dancewear/sportswear aisle), along with the burlap and Thermaflec and ripstop nylons (which will meet in the next section). 

You can't pin cargo netting because of the big holes, so I use sticky tape to hold things in place before sewing. I rip off the tape as I sew, just before the needle touches it. 

You can mark cargo netting, even black cargo netting. I use grease pencils (see photo below), but crayons or soft color pencils would probably work too. 

I use a regular universal needle to sew cargo netting. And I used regular polyester thread. Don't bother with a short stitch length because you're going to be sewing through mostly holes anyway - a medium stitch length is better. 

Cargo netting doesn't fray like cotton fabric frays in little threads, but it does unravel at the cut ends and lose its crisp edge. And serging/zigzagging doesn't work on it because of (you guessed it) the holes and big spaces between strands of actual material. So we finish the edges by binding the seam allowances with something with more body - in this tutorial, I've used grosgrain ribbon, regular ribbon and the ripstop nylon fabric at the seam itself.  

The high proportion of holes to actual "fabric" also causes cargo netting to stretch and morph in all directions as you sew. This might mean that, say, a 15" length of cargo netting ends up being 18" after being accidentally stretched under the presser foot. To prevent this (and remember, we can't pin it in place!), ease it under the foot. This means you feed it generously under the foot as you sew, avoid pulling it in either direction and pay attention to the shape of the holes as you handle it. The holes should remain circular as the fabric moves; if they start looking oval or similarly distorted, you might be unknowingly stretching it.

2 Ripstop nylon 

can also be bought easily. It comes in different weights or thicknesses (and colors). If it's too thin for your purposes, use a double layer, as I did for the circular base of this bag. It layers well because it is light and has hardly any bulk. It can be marked with anything that fabric can be marked with - markers, pens, chalk, etc. It frays copiously when cut, and the ends have to be finished. You can serge them, but I prefer to bind them.

3 Rigid Piping

The piping for this bag is not that soft, furry piping cord people use in upholstery. This is a wet bag, meaning that we'll want it to drain and dry easily and, therefore, furry, absorbent upholstery piping cord would be disastrous. I couldn't find the official hard piping in the usual fabric stores so I improvised with vinyl tubing from the hardware store. It comes in different diameters. Mine was 0.25" in external diameter.

It's stiff, which is good because we want it to help the base hold its circular shape in the complete absence of interfacing. The drawback of its stiffness is that it tends to twist and slide within the fabric piping channel. This makes it somewhat unwieldy under the presser foot, so be prepared to stop-and-lift-the-foot-and-reposition frequently as you work. 

4 Webbing

Webbing is lovely to work with for straps because it comes ready-made. You just cut it to the length you want, finish the cut edges (because they fray something awful) and topstitch those ends onto your bag. If the ends will be tucked into a seam, I don't finish them. If they are going to be exposed, I finish my ends simply by melting (they're polyester, remember) them over a naked flame (like a candle) to seal them, a procedure I call The Candle Method. Here is an old post showing how to do that.

Head over to Part II for the step-by-steps as we put the bag together!

A Limerick For the Strong of Stomach

In her lunch box this morning:

I told her that if she could read it back to me this afternoon when she got home, we'd bake something edible together. Good incentive for reading multisyllabic words, I thought.

P.S. I also put actual food in Jenna's lunch bag. I don't send my kids off to school with just their sense of humor, in case you were wondering. 

Crafteeo's Helmet - A Review and Giveaway

We made a helmet earlier this summer. 

Some months back, Crafteeo sent me their Helmet Kit to try out. The girls and I put it together and in today's post, we're going to tell you all about it.

First, this is a cardboard helmet. Like normal-cardboard cardboard. A bit lighter than amazon-shipping boxes kind of normal cardboard.

That is the most important thing you need to know (if you don't already) - that cardboard becomes amazing things. Especially cardboard paired with electronics. That was my Helmet Kit overview. Now, on to the background.

How-Lun Chen, the brainchild behind Crafteeo is a dad who enjoys making things. One day, he made a helmet for his son and from that experience, was inspired to develop an entire fantasy world called Aeragos.

(image: www.crafteeo.com)

He created helmet kits in two designs and four colorways, one for each of the four Guardian squadrons in his realm, with plans for swords and body armor to come.

Our kit arrived in a smashing white cardboard box (which we saved for future crafts).

Inside were four sheets of pre-printed cardboard

that was also pre-cut,

so we could easily punch out all the pieces.

Each piece was numbered, labeled and marked with fold lines and glue areas.

Some pieces required curving and contouring,

(a pencil was recommended as a form, but we used a hot glue stick because it was convenient).

We worked on our kit over a few days because summer was a busy time for us and we were out all day most days. We spent a couple of hours on the first evening punching out, rolling and assembling half the helmet. Here is Emily (she's almost 9) with the hot glue gun, assembling the pieces. 

I love the level of detail in this helmet

and the resulting rich three-dimensional features.

Many of the surfaces were double-layered: the cardboard was thin enough to be pliable, and any areas of possible weakness were reinforced with at least a second layer. You wouldn't believe how strong this nose bridge piece was.

On the second evening, we finished the construction,

including the installation of the simple electronic circuit that came with the kit.

It was preassembled and securely soldered, and only needed batteries. Ignore our multimeter - you won't need it - it's my best friend whenever I'm playing with my circuit stuff, even if it's just to test battery voltages.

That LED illuminates a decorative piece of plastic in the front of the helmet whenever the helmet is worn, and automatically shuts off when the helmet is removed.

My kids loved the effect.

We painted the helmet on the third day.

The acrylic paints that came with the kit were excellent. I needed only two coats.

I painted all the fiddly bits

and let the girls paint the rest.

Here are different angles of the finished helmet.

Here is the head strap inside the helmet, with little pieces of felt padding for a comfortable fit and to activate the concealed switch that turns on the LED when worn. This head strap is meant to be adjusted to fit the head of the wearer, which was a little tricky for my family since we have three children between 5 and almost-9 years old.

The girth of the helmet fit all three of my kids but the height was perfect for Kate (she's 5)

while it rode a little high on Jenna (who's 7)

and Emily (who's 9).

This was one of the more enjoyable craft kits we've had in a while. The girls enjoyed watching it come together, helping to roll the cardboard pieces, painting it after and even gluing some of the bigger pieces on themselves. They also loved the LED thingy (of course). The materials were of impressive quality. I thought it was very easy to assemble and, because everything was pre-cut, a cinch compared to some of the other cardboard constructions I've made from scratch on my own. I'm excited that Crafteeo is planning more projects to come: a sword, shield and maybe even body armor. 



Something to Note:

• The helmets are designed to fit a 21" (or smaller) head.
• The kit comes with all the materials you need to make one helmet. In our kit were four corrugated cardboard sheets of preprinted and precut helmet parts. There were about 90 parts in total, including 3 plastic parts, 3 felt pieces and 1 soldered electronic circuit. We provided a glue gun, glue sticks, a pencil, and some paint brushes.
• Each kit will make one helmet in one of the two designs - the rounder Northern Guardian and the more pointy Southern Guardian versions. Both designs have the same base structure (below the forehead) and a Northern Guardian/Southern Guardian variation in the crown.

• I'm estimating that it took us about 6-7 hours (spread out over three very leisurely evenings) and 6 regular-size hot glue sticks to make our helmet.
• The pdf pattern comes with full-size templates to glue onto your own cardboard material. The document is US Letter size (8.5" x 11"). A few of the template pieces required assembly with tape (or glue) - these were the rectangular strips that had to go around the head and were too long to be printed whole on letter-size paper.
• The instructions for both the kit and the pdf pattern are entirely on video (there were no printed instructions in our kit) which can be found on the Crafteeo website here and here.  Each video clip is about 1-3 minutes and is silent and annotated. We found them to be excellent, clear, easy to follow and a superior alternative to printed diagrams or photographs.
• If you buy the pdf pattern, you will need to provide your own cardboard (doesn't have to be white). Pick single-wall corrugated cardboard that's similar to or just a little lighter-weight than typical amazon shipping boxes.

Something to Buy:

• Find everything on the Crafteeo shop page. 
• The helmet kits are $24.99 each. They ship domestically as well as internationally. The shipping costs are calculated at the checkout.  
• The pdf patterns alone are $7.99, which you can download to your computer, print out and use over and over again to make as many helmets as you need for your own personal kid-battalions.
• You can also buy the pdf pattern+electronic kit+ paint bundle for $14.99. In other words, everything but the cardboard itself. This way, if you want to build multiple helmets but need a little help with the electronics, (the circuit diagram and shopping list for electronic parts are included in the pdf pattern), you'll have a complete, soldered circuit to work with and/or for a sample with which to make more later.

Something to Save:

Crafteeo is offering a lovely discount for ikatbag readers! Enter the code ikathk2013 at the checkout to get $5 off EACH helmet kit you buy. That's $5 off one helmet kit, $10 off two, $15 off three, and so on. The code is valid till 31 Dec 2013.

Something to Win:

Want to win a free helmet kit? Crafteeo is giving away FIVE kits to my readers! Anyone in the world can enter this giveaway. You'll need to do just two things:

1    Go to Crafteeo's homepage (scroll down to the bottom) to sign up to be on their email list,

to be notified of upcoming products, promotions, and new content as they expand the world of the Aeragos Guardians.  

2   Come back here and log in to the rafflecopter widget below, telling us you've signed up for the email list.  

a Rafflecopter giveaway

The giveaway will run for ONE week, till midnight of Sunday 22 Sept, and I'll randomly pick 5 winners first thing on Monday morning. The winners get to choose which of the four helmet kits they want (you can tell us when we contact you). Good luck!