DIY: printed gift bag

I had a request from a friend to "send her budgie stuff." I don't really have any 'budgie stuff', so I had to make it myself. I sure wish I could find some cute budgie stuff, though

I have these fabric crayons. Basically, all you have to do is draw on some paper and instantly, you've got yourself an iron-on transfer. Pretty nifty, hey? But I wouldn't use them on anything that regularly goes in the wash. I mean, I wouldn't use them AGAIN on anything that goes in the wash. The transfer fades (or at least mine did), so it's best to use them for something that probably won't be washed (much).

I headed to the trusty internet in search of a cute budgie picture and once I found it, I simply traced it out using a fabric crayon. I like to go back over the lines a second time just to make sure they're dark enough.

I had some leftover scraps of white fabric, so I simply turned the crayon side down onto the fabric, and ironed away (don't forget that the image will reverse so if your image needs to be a certain way or has words, be sure to flip it).

That's it! It's important to spend a lot of time pressing and holding the iron on the paper. Even though the instructions say the transfer occurs once you can see the image clearly through the paper, it often needs a little longer than that. This is my second budgie print, and you can see that I didn't hold the iron over his nose area long enough. But that's ok. I kinda like the rough nature of it. Especially all the little loose crayon bits I purposely ironed on as well.

For the bag, I simply sewed two open channels at the top hem, then I put the two right sides together, sewed a straight line down each side and turned it right side out again. This was my second attempt at the bag as I hadn't really thought about the channel spacing in my bird placement for the first one. Sometimes I think that sewing's so easy and then I start doing it and I'll be halfway through and think, "Ohhhhhh... THAT'S how I should have done it." Then just thread a ribbon or string through the top channel and you get a little pull closure.

It's super cute. The pictures don't do it any justice.

can you spot the next DIY?