Fiber Art WIP: Jewelry Travel Organizer

Jewelry Travel Organizer

The craft project I've targeted for dedicated focus until it is done is this jewelry travel organizer kit that I am making for my sister.  It was meant for her birthday in July and I did giver her one part of it the week of her birthday--the earring wallet with a postcard picture of a baby polar bear for a cover.  It had three sections of plastic needlepoint canvas joined on the short sides and it folded accordion style.

The jewelry box, also made with plastic needlepoint canvas, has a top cover with a picture of a mama and baby polar bear.  The picture has a vinal pocket on the back and is attached on its bottom edge to the front edge of the lid so that jewelry can be mounted on the inside of the lid.    I have a tiny mirror mounted with decorative electricians tape but it is coming loose so I'm going to have to rethink that.

I actually gave Carri the box two weeks ago thinking that the project was finished and I was free to move on to the next target (the nearly three years past due Secret Santa project for my Sister-In-Law--the Quilter's Tote) but Carri handed back the earring wallet telling me it wasn't working.  I took back the box too because I'd forgotten to attach the clasp.  Then I spent that weekend rethinking the whole project.

I decided to turn the postcard sized wallet into something that can hold loose items and to crochet the earring wallet.  I spent the whole weekend crocheting the fifteen inch piece seen above.  Then Carri brought me her earring collection so I could mount them for her.  And Lo it did not work!!  The two-chain mesh I worked with size 5 thread was too big.  So after some more thought I decided to put an Aida cloth lining.  That did seem to work.  Especially with the crocheted back putting pressure on the hook keeping them from sliding out.  The lime green ribbon will serve a double purpose--to protect the earrings from scratching each other when the wallet is folded and as part of the clasp holing it closed.

The lime green border on the purple crochet is done in lace weight yarn that I created by pulling apart the four fibers in several yards of Carron Simply Soft yarn.  i put that border on last weekend and during last week spent two days trying to find a way to mount a 15x2.5 inch piece of Aida cloth on a jerry rigged stretcher frame so I could put a backstitch border around the edge to stop fraying while being decorative.  I spent hours and hours untangling the sewing thread I was using to attach it to a loom I'd made from my Martha Stewart loom set.  I finally realized in the wee hours of a morning after extricating myself from the upteenth game of evil cat's cradel I realized that in the time I'd spent on that I could have backstitched around the border four times.  Plenty of time that I could have worked slow enough to stay mindful of my tension and thus prevent the puckering of the cloth that stretching it on a frame is intended to do.

So I spent part of this past weekend doing that.  The remaining steps are:

• attach the crochet, aida and ribbon pieces together
• make the buckle for the clasp out of a 1 in sq piece of plastic canvas
• mount the earrings
• take the mirror off the lid and attach it to the back of the baby polar bear
• create an enclosed wallet with that postcard and the three plastic canvas pieces
• add clasp to jewelry box 

I'll post pic when it is finished.  I'm hoping by Sunday night if not sooner.  Idealiy I'd like to have it done by Friday afternoon so I can get back to work on the Quilter's tote