Zippy pouches

We managed to get some 4" zips quite cheaply, so we decided to try our hand at some small zippy pouches. Getting our head around how to make them was taxing enough but not half as taxing as sewing them was for our poor sewing machines! We wanted them to ooze quality, so we used medium weight iron-on interfacing on both the outer fabric and the inner lining fabric too. We also wanted the zip to have fabric 'stops' at both ends to give a better overall appearance. As usual, we learnt a lot making these! We'd never sewn with a zipper foot before! I even had to look in my sewing machine's handbook to find out what said foot looked like! We were a bit nervous about sewing with the zipper foot but it was a doddle....fortunately!

The sewing machines had great difficulty sewing through all the layers and the zip. Even with a denim needle, the machines protested! We ended up having to slightly move the fabric under the foot to find a spot where the needle would agree to go through all the layers. A few expletives, raised blood pressure and a lot of manual turning of the handwheel later and hey presto, paddy averted! We had to hand finish the pouches by ladder stitching the lining but we couldn't see anyway round that!