Roll With It Baby

Now that I've got that song playing in your head, just from reading the post title....

One of the fun things that happen when you completely rearrange your studio is you find projects that have fallen behind things and gotten lost. ahem. So I found the colored pencil roll in progress that I was making for myself (after making one last year for friend Jaye).

See that post for the tutorial up to this point. Basically I've only sewn together 24 1.5"x10" colored strips of fabric that vaguely match the colored pencils in a Prismacolor 24 set..

That colored strip section is about 22" long and 9.5" high before the next steps.

Here's the first step after you've got the colorful strips sewn together, baste on some flannel to the wrong side. You could also use a very thin quilt batting also.

Next choose a fabric that will be the pocket for the pencils, I chose a very stiff muslin and cut a piece about the same width and same length as the colorful strip base. Iron in half length-wise, baste onto the side and bottom of the colored strips section.

Then you get to choose the fabric you want on the outside of the roll and a ribbon that you want to have to tie it up. I chose a wide purple ribbon an then added some black/white small ribbon on top. The length of the ribbon is about 37", a bit longer would work fine too.

Cut out a piece of the outside fabric you've chose, the same size of the colored strips section and right sides together, sew, leaving a spot on the end to turn it rightside out. Don't forget to baste the ribbon tie on before sewing this seam.

After you've turned everything right-side out and pressed top-stitch around the edge.

Now you stitch on each seam between the colors all the way down to the bottom of the pocket. Instead of sewing each one all in a row, I split it up into 1/4ths to distribute the fullness a bit. One seam in the middle, then another several rows over, another the other direction. Then fill in the rows you've skipped. If you don't stitch it this way, it might end up messy down at the final seam...Or maybe that is just because I don't pin enough when I sew!
Look at all those colors, all laid out and ready to use. Looking at this picture makes me want to go sketch in my sketchbook *right now*.

And here it is all rolled up and ready to go in my sketch bag.