Activity:
Make a T-Shirt Purse
With just a few old shirts with interesting designs to cut out triangles from, your child can make and then design a chic purse all their own. Letting out the fashion designer inside of them, they will boost their creativity and coordination skills, deciding what colors and patterns look best. With the ruler to measure the shapes used for the purse, they will be working with numbers, and then they will be using both their artistic and motor skills in cutting out shapes and then using a steady hand to do a bit of sewing. The best part will be letting them show off their purse, as it will have their own personal flair!
What You Need:
- Scissors
- 2 T-shirts
- Sewing needle
- Thread
- Permanent marker
- Ruler
- Sewing pins
- Colored fabric (optional)
What You Do:
- Help your child lay both shirts down flat on the ground or tabletop. Help her measure and mark out a 9" x 23" x 25" triangle on the center of the first shirt. Make another triangle in the same size on the second shirt.
- Have her cut out each triangle from the shirts. Make sure she cuts through both layers of each shirt for each triangle.
- Each pair of triangles makes one purse. Pick which side of the triangles you want to be the outside of the purse (right side), then pin the pieces together, wrong sides facing out, with a few sewing pins.
- Help your child position the triangles so that they are facing each other but on opposite sides. This will allow the longest sides of each triangle to point toward each other and the shortest sides on the bottom.
- Help your child bring each triangle together so that the shortest ends are now overlapping. Your child will insert the colored triangle they wish to appear in the front of their shirt inside that of the triangle that will not show. Once done, both triangle will share one common 9" bottom.
- Once this is done, help your child to carefully sew up the left and right sides as well as the bottom. The best way to do this is to sew beginning at the top left hand side, then proceeding downward, then sewing the bottom, and then upward to the top of the right side.
- Next, help your child to sew the portions of the triangles that overlap each other across the middle. Be careful to sew through only two layers, not all of them, so your purse is not sewn shut.
- Your purse will then be tied at the top to make the shoulder strap, and your child's purse is created! They can now add any further decorations they wish, such as cutting out other shapes or designs out of other fabric and gluing those to their purse.
On their next shopping trip, your child will love showing off their one of a kind purse!
