Dr. Elephant To The Rescue

In the last of my four bags, I'm going to make an elephant medicine bag. As a girl, I keep a lot of junk in my bag and my medicine bag is one of the most important. It has plasters, pills, lip balm...

Ok, I shall not bother you with them anymore.

Ta-dah! Here it is!


If you can't see it, the heart is the ear, which also is the lock for the bag.
Do scroll down to see what I mean.
The hole separates the trunk from the rest of the body.

Here's what you need:
2 kinds of fabric
1 tag

Here's how to prepare them:

First you need to prepare our template.
Remember to make them symmetrical.
Clockwise: the body (which also doubles as the flap), the ear heart and the base.









The body:
2 pieces of the inside without the hole
2 pieces of the outside without the hole
2 pieces of the flap, with the hole
1 piece for the pocket (the size of this is from the body, traced from the top of the elephant to the pencil line)

The ear:
2 pieces, sewn pack to pack with a blanket stitch

The base:
my cloth was not long enough for me to cut one full piece, so I had to cut it in 2 and sew it together.
You can cut one long piece.
What I did was use a string to measure the length of the body to know how long a piece I needed for the base.

Here's a picture of all the pieces.

















Here's how to do it:

First, sew the base pieces together, if you are like me and your cloth isn't long enough to make one single long piece.

Next, draw the holes onto the 2 flap pieces. Make sure the holes are opposite each other, like in the picture.

Sew them together alone the top of the elephant. This is just to have the two pieces in place. Later you will dew it up on the outside with a running stitch. That will be 4 steps down.

Leave the the bottom straight line open.

Turn it inside out. Take note of the 2 holes you've drawn.

Cut a hole in the 2 fabrics and cut slits along the holes.

Sew the hole up, both pieces together. You can choose to use the blanket stitch.

Next, sew along the perimeter of the elephant, except the bottom. (remember this step 4 steps up?)

Now for the pocket. Simply sew the top down.

Now, sew the base and the 2 body pieces together along the insides. When sewing the inside pieces, don't forget the pocket piece (see next picture).

Remember to leave the top open so you can turn the outside piece outside in.

Remember to leave the top open.
Remember the pocket too.

The inside piece, which is this piece for me, does not need to be turned outside in. I turned it this way for you to see the pocket.

Place the inside piece inside and place the flap into position.

Fold down the top neatly and pin them up.

Don't forget your tag. I don't want it to be seen from the outside so I placed it there.

Now you can sew it up.

Place the heart in the position you think is suitable as an ear.

Sew down the middle of the heart.

Notice the arrow. Do not sew until the end. Leave at least the length of one single stitch away from the tip of the heart.

Now put the flap down and trace the line of the centre of the heart where you have just sewn.

Cut a slit through the 2 pieces of the flap.

Now sew the slits up. You can choose to use blanket stitch too.

Here's the fun part - putting the heart through the slits. 

And Ta-dah!