Make It Yourself - Santa Sack

Just a couple more sleeps until the big man in the red suit drops by. Preparations are still in full swing at our house and I can't wait to fall in a heap celebrate our first Christmas as a family of four.

I managed to finish the girls' Santa Sacks just in time. You could honestly make one of these in half an hour but I chose to do some hand stitching which made them take about one and a half hours each. Michaela is well chuffed with hers and despite it being empty!! Here is a little run down if you would like to make one yourself.

Materials for one Santa Sack
The completed sack is approximately 52cms x 70cms

Fabric- 80cm x fabric width (110cm)
Ribbon/ Trim/ Ric Rac- 110cm
Cotton Twill Ribbon - 100cm
3 sheets felt
3mm cord -160cms
Embroidery thread and needle

1 Cut fabric to dresired length (I chose 80cms)

2 Fold down top edge approx 1cm (as per pic below) and iron flat. Fold over again so that the raw is concealed. Stitch in place.

3 Place ric rac on right side of fabric 5 cms from top edge and pin in place. Stitch.

4 Fold over edge of twill ribbon (to prevent fraying) and pin this in place 5 cms below ric rac. Ensure that this ribbon on centred on the fabric. Stitch along top and bottom of ribbon.

5 Now fold the fabric in half, carefully lining up the edges and pin securely. Stitch the side edge (selvedge edges) and bottom to create the sack. The selvedge edges will not fray but I chose to zig zag the raw edge of the bottom seam. Turn right side out.

6 I decided on a simple initial for each of the girls' Santa Sacks. I printed the letters before pinning and cutting them out from the felt. I blanket stitched the red felt letter onto green felt before tracing out a large circle on the green felt and cutting it out. The hand stitching was obviously more time consuming, you can machine stitch the felt initial in place of course and use a fancy machine stitch. The 6 strands of embroidery thread does stand out nicely on the completed sack though ;)

7 Pin the green felt circle in the centre of one side of the sack. Stich in place, again I blanket stitched this but machine is fine.

8 Thread cord through the 'tunnel' created with the twill ribbon. Tie each end with a knot to prevent fraying (I also used some Fraystop)

9 Leave under the Christmas Tree on Christmas Eve for Santa to fill with presents!!