Mar 12, 2012

I'm always up for a challenge.


 Cindy (so the cook said) and I found boxes of dime roll wrappers at Goodwill and were intrigued.  What could we do with the cute wrappers?  We challenged each other a week to find a creative use for the rolls.  No problem, I thought.  Helloooo Pinterest.  But, there was a problem.  Apparently no one else on the entire web had ever thrifted a box of coin wrappers.  I enlisted my creative team to come up with ideas.  The team consisting of my best friend and my mom.  Mom was thinking like me and suggested a wreath, Regina thought that I needed to stick with something to do with money and suggested a wallet.  Smarty.  I had gotten a newspaper wallet at Barnes and Noble at Christmas so I used it for inspiration.

 Step One:  Sew strips of wrappers together.
Step Two:  Basket weave your strips.
Step Three:  Spray sealer on finished weave to make the paper more durable.  Maybe you should go outside for this.  I'm convinced that Mod Podge has kept the same seventies branding because the hippie crafters used clear acrylic sealer for more reasons than one.
Step Four:  Dig around in your sewing notions for a zipper that fits.  Please do me a favor and buy old notions.  Don't walk away from a grandmother's collection of buttons and zippers.  You will find a use someday and the packaging is so much better than new.
Step Five:  Cut a piece of fabric to line wallet, make bias strips to match, sew to weave.  I used one of my old feedsacks.  I wonder what the thrifty housewife that carefully preserved my sacks would think of my use of her fabric?
Step Six:  Sew zipper to short edges of weave.  I couldn't write a DIY that could even begin to show this part... just make it work.  Fiddle and jam.
Step Seven:  Zig Zag the folded sides together. 
You can bet your bottom $5 dime roll that I will be carrying my new clutch to Goodwill this week.  
There is a small problem with my project.  I used 52 coin rolls.  I bought 1000.