Make a Zipper Pouch with Jenny Doan of Missouri Star! (Video Tutorial)

Hi, I'm Jenny from MSQC. Many of you have been asking me how to put a

zipper

on a bag. So today what we are going to do is

make

a bag. And I'm going to show you how to put on a

zipper

. And it's much easier than you think. So to

make

this project, what you will need is a zipper. And the zipper should be a little longer than the bag you are making. And then you will need scraps and a piece of fusible fleece. And fusible fleece is soft on one side and rough on the other because it is ironed onto the fabric.

And you will need a solid piece that is the size you want, twice the size you want your bag to be. So I cut this one out, it's about 9 by 20. I only cut half the width of the fabric, just a little strip. And then for the top, we're just going to use scraps. And we are going to make these dear bags. You can see, I have several here. And they are all different sizes. You make it the size you need. And I mean they are very fun and fast. I think you'll get really addicted to these once you

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t.

So what I did here was I took my fleece and put it on top of the wrong side to fuse my fusible fleece, with the bumps, onto the wrong side of my fabric. And we're going to move on to iron to do that. And this really only takes a minute. Simply iron slowly and gently. You probably want to make sure your fabric is a little larger than your fleece because you don't want to stick it to your ironing board. So just watch your edges and make sure they don't hang down or you'll get caught on something you don't want to be stuck to.

So let's go little by little. And then I like to turn this around and do it from the other side as well. You just want it to stay there very well. These bags are so much fun. In fact, when I

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ted making them to show you this

tutorial

on how to put on the zipper, I got a little addicted to making bags. And I made several. And it's very fun and fast, I think you'll love it. Alright, now we need to make the top of our bag. And what I've done here is I'm going to take this little piece right here.

We could also remove the wrinkles from that. And I'm going to place it right in the middle of my piece of fabric. And then I have this 2 ½ inch strip that I'm going to put on, right on the sides. And we're going to sew this like this. On each side we are going to sew a strip. So let's head over to the sewing machine and do it right now. So I'm going to put the right sides together here. Now, the nice thing about doing this is that it will be completely padded as we finish it. I'll sew around here, but I'll sew all three layers together so it's quilted as we go.

So let's come over here and see if we can get this to work. Alright. Now I'm just using my regular quarter inch foot. And just make sure they're lined up. And you, you see, I didn't really even measure it when I put them on. Really do not care. These are very quick and fun projects. So now that I've sewn this side, I'm going to go ahead and sew this side. And really what I'm doing is just making a little decorative lid for my bag. The bag may actually be a solid piece of fabric. Alright, now we get to the end of this second strip and I'm going to sew right from the edge.

All right, now let's press these back over here. So I just put them up here and I just roll them back and press them back. So now you can see that the top is actually pretty much finished as it is. You can see the padding showing here. But I like the look of the topstitching, so I'm going to go back and topstitch right along these edges. So let's do that. Now when I topstitch, what I'm going to do is place the edge of my foot right along the fold here. And that will be my guide to topstitching until the end.

I think the stitching just dresses up a small bag. One of the fun things about these bags is that I'm not organized by nature, I'm just not. And that's why bags help me organize things. I have one that puts in all the cell phone cables when I travel. You know, I mean, I use them for everything. So now we have this little piece finished and sewn and we can decide how big we want our bag. So what I'm going to do is trim my selvage edges and my jagged edges. I'm going to trim this side. We'll trim it to match the top of our piece here.

Now look how this fabric sticks out on this side. Let's go ahead and crop it out even with our edges. And what I do because sometimes my strips are not, you know, I mean, this one I can see is curved here. So it's not exactly 2 ½, so I'm going to measure from this line here to make sure it's even all the way to the end. And we're just going to cut it right there at that point. This is so fun because you can, I mean, you can make it any size and any fabric. You can customize them for anyone, you know, who might want one that's like this one that has bikes.

I mean it's really fun. Alright. Now I have this long piece and I can decide if I want short bags like this or if I want a long, big bag. I think what we're going to do today is make a couple of six inch bags here. And let's see, I think what I'll do is use my mat to make sure I have the correct lengths here. And in fact I think I'm going to do nine inches. I've got enough here, I'm pretty sure. Always double to check and make sure. You don't want to cut yourself and have a bigger one.

So there's a nine inch piece and I'm going to cut another nine inch piece right here. Let's put this here and crop it. Now I could have made it a little bigger and used that whole piece. It's really whatever you want to do. This is your bag. Now we have our finished blouse and it is lined, which is really great. You can see how fast it was. And it's time to prepare our zipper. So what do you want to do with your zipper? We have these 14 inch zippers. And they come in all kinds of colors and you know, they're just amazing.

They are nylon. And the great thing about this is that you can cut them to any length. You don't, you're not trapped by the head and the little staple down here. You can cut them to any length. And you want to cut the zipper one inch shorter than your bag. So the first thing we have to do is prepare our zipper. Now, to do that, I cut a 1 ½ inch piece of fabric, just a little bit here, I think it's four or five inches long here. So 1 ½ you know around five. And we're going to come here and we're going to figure this out together.

So what I'm going to do. Let me show you real quick here. Am I going to fold this in half right here? And then I'm going to fold these pieces toward the center like this, and iron, iron everything like this. This will be the beginning and end piece of our zipper. So this is something important. So let's go ahead and fix this. And iron this. This is like a tab. I guess we're making a tab. Make sure it lies nice and flat. A small injection of steam. I'm going to double that. And then you get a piece that looks like this.

So it's like they are ironed together over and over again. And this will be the final piece of our zipper. So here comes where you have to be a little brave. We're going to take this first part of the zipper here and where this basic element is here, we're going to go ahead and cut it like this. And you want to make sure that the zipper head is on the other side of that. Then we're going to put this little piece of our little folded tab here over the end, like this. And we're going to topstitch along this edge here.

Just a little topstitching and sew it. So now that's our end. So I'm going to come here and sew this little piece, right here. And I like to sew from the front and the back. And I try to hit that same line. Here we go. And then we're just going to crop this. Uh, oh, look, look, both sides didn't understand. You want to make sure both sides engage. So let's go back and make sure they understand each other. That could have been dangerous. So let's make sure they understand each other. In fact, I'm always very happy when something like that happens because you guys need to know that, no, I mean, not everything we do works, just like that.

I mean, we work to make sure these things work, but you know, every once in a while something like this happens. And it happens to all of us. So now we have this end of our zipper tab finished. And we're going to place the zipper along the edge of our bag. And we want to cut our zipper one inch shorter than the bag. So I'm going to put my bag on this line. And I'm going to match my zipper all the way. And then I'll come here and move an inch. Now, this is fundamental, very, very important.

This zipper head here should be on this side. If you cut it, you need a new zipper. So let's move this zipper down so it's secure. Let's line them up. And then we're going to cut an inch inward. So here we go, one inch in, we're cutting. And we are going to do the same. So let's place this, place our little tab over the ends of the zipper. And hopefully this time we'll catch up to both sides. This would be a great place to use a zig zag or, you know, a decorative stitch. So make sure they're lined up like this.

And you're just going to place them on this fabric and sew them together. So let's go here and do that. It's a little easier when the two queues are separate. It's a little easier to put them together when you're sitting at the sewing machine. Less possibilities of movement. And then we're just going to move on. Here we go. And again and again. Alright. Look at the other side, ha! Success! That one came out very well. So what I'm going to do now is just trim these edges even with the zipper like this. Now we have this little zipper that is primed and ready to go.

I like to close it and make sure it works. And now comes the installation of the zipper part. You're going to love this. It's so, so easy. So what we're going to do is take our zipper and place it face down on our fabric, like this. We'll move it so it's about half an inch on each end. And I'm going to start this way. It doesn't matter which way you start. My left-handed brain just sees things differently. So what I'm going to do now is go in and sew along the side of this zipper. So your zipper is again face down on the right side of your fabric and we're just going to sew a little seam here.

Get, you know, you can, I mean, I would stay a little bit away. Look how you can see these zippers a little bit. The zipper really enhances the design of the bag. So I don't do it, I don't sew completely, but between the zipper and the edge. You want to make sure it sticks well. And then you do that. So come with me here and let's sew this zipper. So the zipper is half an inch on each end. And an easy way to do this is, if you have where you can move the needle, you can leave the quarter inch foot on and just slide the needle a little bit, which is what I've done.

So now I'm sewing down. And when you get to the part where the head is, you will slide that head past the needle. So I'm going to lift my foot and quickly walk past it. And keep sewing it. And just sew from the end. Alright. We've actually installed one side of our zipper. Let me get these threads out of the way. And now what I like to do is go back and I'm going to fold this like this. And now I'm going to sew it. Because again, I like the look of the topstitching. So let's just put this behind us and let me close it.

Place this back and we're going to sew it right along this edge and that will hold it down. It looks like there's a little more work to do. Alright, I'm in the head, I need to slide it down. Zipper head, come on, come on, come on. And I don't know if you know this, but when you lift your foot, if you push the lever a little further, the foot goes up even more. Then you can lift that foot a little higher and slide it back. Alright. Now we have half of the zipper on. It is sewn and ready to go.

Now we need to add it to the other side. And we are going to do the same. So we're going to place our zipper, let me see which side I have here, on the top of our fabric, like this starting half an inch inward. And we're going to sew all the way through this. edge. And I'm going to go ahead and pull this zipper down to give myself a little bit of room to get started. Again, just to make sure we're clear. We have the zipper down on the top of our fabric. And we're going to sew right along that edge.

Again, we place it half an inch along the top of our bag, half an inch inward. And we're just going to sew here. Now I've reached the zipper, so I'll lift my foot and slide the zipper head past my foot. Ah, there we go. Sometimes that takes a little work. Wow, foot down. Alright. And then we'll come back and sew this side. Alright. Now you have installed a zipper on the top of your zipper bag. And it looks great. This is also important. Make sure the zipper is open because now we're going to close our bag, which means we're just going to put the right sides together, sew everything around this way and it will closeour bag.

But if you leave the zipper closed, you will have no way to turn your bag. And so, the zipper leaves us a gap to open our bag. So leave the zipper open and we're going to sew all the way around our bag. So let's line up our pieces here. We're going to go in just outside of that half inch mark. And we're going to sew all around it. Now I like to go, because this is a raw edge, one of the things I like to do is go back and I like to zigzag around the side of my bag just to make sure that things are there, that they're all there. , everything inside and good.

Let me prepare my zig zag here. Very good. Now we have a nice, flat, finished bag. Now, if any of you have seen any of the

tutorial

s on bags, he knows that if he wants to square the bottom of his bag, what he's going to do is go in here and just separate them right here like this. And sew in a straight line. And that will give us a flat bottom in our bag. And I think we should go ahead and do that in this case. Let's, let's just put this out. We make sure that these seams line up here, the top and bottom seam.

And we're just going to sew in a straight line. Remember, however wide and far you are from the point, if you enter an inch, then it will be your. Oops, I have to change my stitch again. So if you come in one inch from the point, then it will be one inch on either side. Alright, now I'm going to do this side. Separate it. I like to put my hand in there. Line up my seams. And then we're going to sew it along the bottom. You can leave it flat. I made several that were flat. They are loved.

But this is a bigger bag so I think it should be able to hold up. Now I have these two little bunny ears that I can choose to cut off or leave on. I think I'll just leave them. And now we can turn our bag. This is when the magic happens. This is where the fun part comes for me. So I'm just going to take out the bottom corners. And we have a little bag here. We're going to push up the ends of our zipper. And I just like the way that, you know, when you put a little tab on a zipper, it just makes it, it's a nicer zipper.

It just makes it more enjoyable. So here is our little bag with our little zipper. Check it out. And you can see how clean these ends look. I mean, I really like the little tabs on the zippers. You can actually sew the zipper right into the seam, but I like how these little tabs look. You know there are many ways to do things. Now we have this lovely little zipper

pouch

. And now you know how to put a zipper on a bag, a wallet or anything else you need. And we hope you enjoyed this MSQC tutorial.