Elegant Felt Coin Purse

Back in fourth grade, I remember making a little felt coin purse that I had hand embroidered a little raccoon on to.  I absolutely loved it, and was so proud of myself for coming up with something like that.  But, my sense of style has changed a bit since then, so I felt the little coin purse needed an upgrade.  And, now that I have a new sewing/embroidery machine to play with, it's even easier to do!

Materials:

• Craft Felt - about the same size as a sheet of computer paper
• Scissors
• Sewing Materials
• Sew-on Snap closures
• Fabric Pen

Instructions:

1. Take a piece of felt and cut it straight down the middle the long way (hot dog style), so that you have two narrow rectangles.  
2. Now, fold your narrow rectangle in half the opposite way, and mark the crease with a fabric pen that will wash off or disappear
3. Fold this rectangle again, and mark the two new creases your create in the same manner.
4. Unfold the rectangle, and you should have a piece with four quadrants.  If you want to put an embroidery on the wallet, do so in the second quadrant from the top.  This would be the time to embroider a design on the wallet if you'd like.
   
   
   



Figure 1

5. Now, fold the piece in half again, as shown in Figure 1
6. Turn it over to the wrong side, and then fold down the back flap, as shown below in Figure 2.  Then, fold this back piece down.
   
   

   

   Figure 2

7. Cut the piece you folded down completely off.
8. Now, fold the top piece down to create your wallet.  Using a fabric pen, outline how you want the back flap of your wallet to look.  As you can see in Figure 3, I chose to create a deep V, so that the back of my wallet looked a bit like an envelope.  Then, cut along these lines.
   
   

   

   Figure 3

9. Sew the sides and edge the back flap.  I chose to use a zig-zag stitch on my sewing machine with gold thread that matched the embroidered 'A' on the front.  This was very simple, as I just had to start from one corner, and sew one continuous line around to the other corner by keeping the flap open.
10. Finally, sew on a snap enclosure, and you're finished!  You have an elegant little felt purse that  is very simple and cheap to make!

What kind of wallet/coin purse do you carry?