Last week I made two items featuring patchwork and this pouch is one of them (the other is this patchwork bag).
This was made using the Idea Pouch pattern. This pattern has kind of a funny name because I'm just not that inventive with naming them! Usually, I try to call them something fairly factual, which makes it easy for me and helpful for people searching online for things to sew. This was designed to be a larger pouch for iPads or other tablets, but it couldn't be named anything with iPad for trademark reasons. Since it also holds some writing or drawing journals, and thus any ideas or thoughts written in them, it was named the Idea Pouch.
The fabrics I used for this project are the floral fabric featured in this blog post and a blue version of Robert Kaufman's Essex Linen. The Essex Linen looks kind of grey in these photos and it is a blue-grey color, but it's definitely more blue than grey. I'm not sure which version of Essex Linen this one is and originally thought it was "Indigo", but then I can't find an Indigo colorway mentioned on Kaufman's site...so all I know is it's blue.
The main pouch has patchwork lining. This works beautifully in this pouch and though it takes some extra time to make the patchwork, it did save me the time I would have spent search high and low to find a complimentary fabric large enough for this piece (D). At 18.5" high, piece D is kind of tall!
Which reminds me that I wanted to tell you that if you are making an Idea Pouch and have half yard cuts of fabric, it's fine to take 1/2 - 3/4" off the height of piece D. It will still fold down and cover the top of the pleated pocket if you take some off the height to make it work with a 1/2 cut of fabric.
Finally, I wanted to mention that in the pattern ribbon is used for the button tie and the ribbon is sewn to the top of the flap. But here I've used hemp cord, which can't be sewn through or it will fray apart. If you want to use something that can't be sewn, the solution is to tie the cord to one of the buttons. I use a couple knots to make sure it stays on for a good long while. If it wears out or falls off, I'll just replace it with a new piece of cord.
