an evening of sewing...

This weekend I got a lot of crafting done. It helped that all sewing notions and some fabric was 50% off at JoAnn's last week.

I read a super awesome tutorial recently about making a camera bag out of an old purse or bag on hand. Asa got a new camera a few months ago. Then I got him a photography class for his birthday this month. I wanted him to have a cool camera bag, instead of the felted knitting project bag that he's been using.  Since we couldn't find the perfect bag that didn't cost a ton, I started going through our closets to find a bag that would be the right size and not too girly for Asa to carry his camera in. And then I found Asa's old school bag, one that he very rarely used and was about the right size for my plan. Also, because this camera bag is just a foam pouch that is inserted into his bag, he can remove the insert if he wants to use the bag for another purpose.

The bag BEFORE

Ashley over at Make It and Love It has several cool sewing project tutorials on her blog. She sews for herself, her children, her home and for gifts and her tutorials are chock full of easy to follow directions and amazing photos that show me just what I need to do.

Asa's bag is an old Isreali Paratrooper bag, so we wanted to find a fabric suited (and not girly) for the bag. We found many fabrics that were cool and fit with the paratrooper idea, but they were all really dark, and I wanted to be sure to have a light colored fabric so Asa could see what he was doing inside the insert.
This insert took under three hours to make and since they were having a sale at JoAnn's, I got the foam, this particular fabric, thread and velcro all 50% off and came in at around $10.00.  I even have enough foam to make one more of these custom camera bag inserts and enough left over material to make pouches for Asa's camera gear that needs protecting.

The completed insert

Brand new camera bag!