Car Organiser

Are your nerves completely frazzled every time you go away on a family holiday? The trouble is that cars don't have storage space for all the things kids need while travelling. Rita Hill came up with a perfect solution to this problem. She made bags to go over the backs of the car seats with pockets for drinks, books, games, CDs and comics. The dimensions of the bags Rita made suit the average sized car.

You will need

1/2 to 1 metre of fabric (depending on the fabric width)
1 length of dowel

Step by step instructions

1. Choose fairly sturdy fabrics in prints that the kids will like.
2. Cut three pieces measuring 42x32cm, 32x32cm and 22x32cm. Sew a hem along one of the 32cm ends of the largest rectangle. It must be wide enough to fit a piece of dowel through (about 3.5cm). Sew a normal hem on the other two pieces, also on only one of the 32cm ends.
3. Cut two strips measuring 55x5cm, and one measuring 120x5cm.
4. Iron all edges in on the strips. Fold the two 55x5cm strips in half lengthways and sew them down to create two ties for the top of the bag.
5. Place the smallest piece of fabric onto the middle-sized piece and sew it up the middle. Then place these joined pieces onto the largest piece and pin them down. Join them all together by sewing along the outside edge.
6. Sew up the two shorter strips and then sew them onto the back of the bag.
7. Thread a length of dowel through the top of the bag so that it's not too floppy. Make sure that the dowel is a little shorter than the material so that the edges of the bag can still be sewn up.
8. Sew the longer strip right around the outside of the bag to hide all the raw edges. This long piece should be a little longer than you'll need just to allow for any differences in your hem sizes. When sewing this onto the bag, tuck in the raw edges on the short sides of this strip to suit your bag.

Cost

Enough fabric and a length of dowel for one bag would cost around $8. If you have leftover scraps of material at home you could use those for a fraction of the cost.

Copyright CTC Productions 2000