Doggy bag?!

I've done some more sewing this week - prepping a backpack picnic set for Di.  I'm very chuffed with how it's turned out.

The basic backpack was a Gumtree find.  It hadn't been used and held a 4-place setting - cutlery, plates, plastic wine glasses and a small cutting board.

As experienced picnickers, we added extra essentials - a large tablecloth (with tablecloth clips), sharp knife (complete with custom sheath), purple napkins and storage containers, various co-ordinated bags/pouches as well as teaspoons and thermal mugs.

The mugs were a wonderful bargain, bought nearly 10 years ago at a liquidation ware-house for $1.00 each. As they retailed for more than $10.00 usually, we bought 20! After lots of careful consideration, I've decided to gift Di four of my stash. Generous, eh?!

The starry bag is a new idea. It's the same style as my kettle bags and loo kits but lined with leftover plastic tablecloth material. The size is generous to stow dirty plates, cups etc for washing when home again. (Now that I've made a prototype, I'll do one for me, too)!

Sharp thinking!

We do a lot of picnics, so our picnic kit is well equipped.  We usually carry two sharp knives - one for bread and the other for anything else!

A while back I made a denim sheath for our bread knife and it's non-serrated companion.

That effort (shown in the bottom collage pic) wasn't an ideal solution, so I've been thinking of a better storage method.

The denim cover will still be used, when carrying dirty knives home for washing. 

During the week we visited Reverse Garbage and bought some thin leather pieces, which were priced at $17/kg.  I only paid a few dollars for my choices.

Nick helped cut two shaped pieces, one for each knife.  They fold along the top edge of the blades.  Both pieces were wet and then folded in place around the knives, secured by paper clips.

About 24 hours later, those large paper clips were removed.  I then used my sewing machine to sew along the curved edge of each sheath.  I worked very slowly and carefully, using a longer stitch.  I sewed two rows of stitching, one directly over the other, for extra strength and security.

After checking both knives fit into their new covers, I trimmed away some excess leather.

I'm quite pleased with the result - cos I wasn't sure my machine would sew through two layers of leather.  Hooray!