Sewing for friends

It's so nice to have talented friends here and abroad. You get to suggest swaps and get packages in the mail. I sent off a package to Corinne (PiecedbyPeace) in Germany. She asked for some "boxes" to keep scraps etc in while sewing. Colors suggested were green, a bit of red and white. I have made a few boxes in the past and have had varing results. Using a new pattern from Ayumi Takahashi's book "Patchwork, Please!", I modified her "My Scrappy Box pattern", so that the box could be folded flat for shipping, thank you IKEA. I also ended up made 2 boxes of different sizes and various coordinating but not matching patchwork.
This is what I ended up with:

nested boxes, the inner box (taller) is from the original pattern.

 For anyone that wants to mail these boxes without incurring cost prohibitive postage, if you (at step # 9) sew into the side seams, about 1.5 " from the top edge on each side, a small elastic hair band, you will create a way to hold the sides up without ladder stitching the sides closed (step #15). All you then have to do is add a button to the adjacent side panel and loop the elastic around the button.

side buttons added to ease with shipping

end buttons added

These can be unbuttoned and folded flat for shipping and once your friend gets the box, if they like, they can ladder stitch the sides.

I did use some fun fabric for the box linings,

the "toile" fabric reminds me of the designs on some old fashioned plates. The one I chose has 2 quilts hanging from a clothes line strung between 2 trees. Kinds old fashioned and cheeky at the same time.