Upgrade and Improvement

Awhile back I made myself a new iPad cover, you can read about it here if interested.  I really liked the design, liked its functionality, and ease of use.  What I didn't eventually care for is the fabric selection I chose to do the cover in, as it had a dingy look to it.  But, I went ahead and used the fabric because my husband picked it out while we were out shopping one day.  I wanted something more feminine and pretty.  This February, while traveling along the Oregon coast on a quilt run, I found this fabric that I just love.    It is the top piece in the picture below called Inspirations by Yuwa.  I think it is pretty and feminine.

In using the original cover for over half of a year, I wanted to make some changes and additions to a new one, if I ever got around to making one again.  These are the things I wanted to add or change:

1.  Include a clear plastic cover to protect the light pretty color from getting dirty and keep the fabric from wearing out faster, especially at the corners.

2.  I wanted to add a zipper to the bottom pocket to hold non-paper items, particularly my charging cord.

3.  Make a  middle cloth divider that would protect the screen from pens and zipper.

4.  Provide a pen/pencil holder

5.  Have more pockets on the left side.

6.  Include a couple of business card/credit card pocket holders.

7.  Handle on the spine for easier carrying and holding of the cover.

I am not much of a designer, so I had to give this some deep thought, forming the steps of changes in each step of the original pattern.  I took the original pattern, and would try to envision where I would need to add the steps of the new additions or changes I wanted to make, and made pencil notes where I thought they should happen along the way of making the cover.   Want to let you know right now, my envisioning didn't go very well, especially if any math was involved.  Sigh!

So, I finally bit the bullet, got all the original pieces and additional pieces cut out, and started to put it together.  Another one of my character flaws, is I always get ahead of myself, and speed ahead to future steps without thinking of what I should have done or taking a minute to think about what I might have missed.  Thank goodness for a seam ripper and by razor blade, because I had to take out a few seams and apart a few pieces to go back and do a missed step, or a total re-do because I didn't envision it just right.

Here is the first picture I took (see there's that character flaw) when I remembered to get out my phone to finally get a picture.  My actual thought was, "Oh, maybe I should be taking some pictures of me actually working on this, so my readers will believe I really made it!!"  Silly me.  It shows the different sections getting ready to be sewn all together for the final outcome.

Here are the pictures of the final iPad feminine pretty cover (Note: there are a lot of pictures):

This first picture is the front closed view.  If you look close, you will see, I used some crochet edging.  It came off os a simple vintage linen table runner.  I loved the edging and the color of pink.  It was a good fit with the fabric.  I stitched bits and pieces over some of the printed lace on this piece of fabric, and I made it into the velcro closure tab. 

1.  Plastic Cover

This shows the velcro closure.
















Upon opening the holder, the left side holds the pockets and card holders.  I put some vintage lace I had on hand edging the top of the pockets.  There are actually five pockets, one zippered pocket, and one business card / credit card holder on this side.  Please note, that I had to do some hand stitching at the bottom, were all the pockets are laying on top of each other, and the layers were too thick to go through the sewing machine.

2. Zippered Pocket
5. Additional Pockets
6.  Business Card / Credit Card Holder

As the holder is open with the pockets exposed, I sewed in a cloth, quilted divider that will act as a screen protector.  I sewed a pen/pencil holder on this divider.

3.  Middle Divider

4  Pen / Pencil Holder

Now, when you flip over the divider, you see where the iPad is housed.  I used the four corners from the vintage linen table runner as the holders for the iPad.  Note they look better once the iPad is fitted in the four corner pockets.

See, here is the iPad loaded.

This shows my charging cords going into the zippered pocket.

And, this is a close up of the business card/credit card holder at the bottom of the pocket section.  I store my screen cleaner in one of these pockets.

So, there you have it, a new pretty feminine iPad holder.  I succeeded to get all the additions / changes incorporated into this new holder, with the exception of a handle.  I just couldn't get that one addition calculated into the cover.  Maybe if I do some envisioning and pondering, I can work it into the next one I do.  Doubtful, but worth the time to think about doing it.

Warmest...