Zip-Up Cardholder Wallet

I made this Zip-Up Cardholder Wallet for a birthday gift for a friend and sent it to her. It is a free pdf pattern by All Sew Petite. There is also a hack that I saw where you could add a strip with a snap to fit over the cards for extra security and a flap that snaps over the back slip pocket. I decided to just make the original pattern, but I added a plastic snap on the back without a flap. I think that worked better than a flap and was a lot easier too.

2 card pockets on one side.

For credit cards or business cards.

The other side has a slip pocket and I added a heart shaped plastic snap. There is a hack to add a flap with a snap, but I thought this worked just as well and was easier and faster to do.

The slip pocket opened.

Zipper pocket opened. You could use this pocket for coins and cash or whatever.

Karen received this and she emailed me a very nice compliment about it too. Glad you like it Karen.

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Sew Powerful Purses #252-254 for 2026

We went to Durango, Colorado and stayed in a cabin for a few days. I brought a bag of purse kits to sew. I sewed all the pieces from the kits that I could sew before needing to press and turn the flaps. Then I started to sew some into purses. I completed 3 purses. The rest in the bag can be completed after September, which is the annal Sew Powerful Purse Sew-a-thon. I need a break from making the entire purse until then. I have been working on creating some flaps now as that is fun. I have close to a sack full of just flaps, but the rest of the purse bodies to go with those flaps will be cut in a few months or anytime after September when the mood strikes. Here are the 3 that I finished while in Durango.

You can see the hazy mountain through the trees. The air was fine, but hazy from the fire 🔥from Utah. We went into the Historic Durango area when we arrived to pick up some groceries. It was on a Wednesday morning and the traffic was crazy busy!!! Plus, there are so many hotels/motels along the highway outside of Historic Durango now. We were shocked at this. I guess they have tourists nonstop all year round. We were here about 20-25 years ago and those hotels weren't there and there weren't many cars at all on the road in Durango or the highway then. For a town with under 20,000 residents, this is crazy. Housing prices are insanely pricey, so how do the people who work in the stores and restaurants afford to live there? They must have to live in a house with several other adults to split the costs to afford it? I don't know, but like so many towns (especially in Colorado,) like Aspen, Telluride, Ouray, Durango, and more, how can people afford the housing, let alone everything else? Most rentals these days are not for long term rents for people anymore. They are being turned into air B&B's because they can ask a lot more per night than a monthly rental and make more money than on a month-to-month basis with a lease. I guess you have to be a multi-millionaire these days to be able to afford to buy a house most places? 

The temperature was 98 degrees 🔥 in Durango, only 5 degrees cooler than here with the heat wave we have been having. But the evenings cooled off more in Durango than here, so that was nice. We did have AC in the cabin or I would have keeled over from the heat 😜!!! We probably won't go back to that area again. We already have too much traffic here, so why drive so far just to be in traffic when we get there? The drive going there and coming back home was nice and not many cars on the road.

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Sew Powerful Purse #251 for 2026

This purse photo must have gotten lost in my purse blog sharing, so I am sharing it now. Scrappy pieced flap.

Please donate to this wonderful organization that helps girls and women. Any amount would help. Thank you so much! I am passionate about making these purses to donate to the girls in Zambia so they can stay in school when they are in their monthly periods and your donations help to fill the purses with the needed supplies that are made by the seamstresses right there in Zambia. Please donate by clicking here or on the  image above.

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Sew Powerful Purses #235-250 for 2026

16 purses finished to donate to Sew Powerful Purse Project. All African countries with animals.

Zambia is the country where the purses are donated to for the girls that are filled with monthly hygiene products, allowing the girls to stay in school all month, every month.

A couple of Kenya leopards.

4 Congo elephants.

4 Botswana zebras.

4 more Zambia giraffes. 

Please donate in my honor for the Sew-a-thon. Click here and then choose the amount to donate. $10 fills one purse to keep one girl in school. Thank you so much for your support!🤗

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Sew Powerful Purses #229-234 for 2026 + Annual Fundraiser for Sew Powerful. Can you Help?

6 more purses to donate to Sew Powerful Purse Project. These were made by fussy cutting the African stamp fabrics and sewing scraps and rickrack. These are 2 countries/animals of the 5 countries/animals that I am making into purses. Here are 6 purses using red fabrics to create the purses. I have more purses to share in other colors and countries/animals soon.

The annual Fundraiser started July 27 and will continue through September 30th, 2026. The entire month of September is the Sew-a-thon part, so any purses made during September counts for my Sew-a-thon goal that month only. I hope to sew 180 purses in September alone. Wish me luck! I would love it you could donate any amount that you can in my honor. $10 fills one purse with the hygiene items needed for each girl. Go here to donate in my name: https://www.sewathon.org/daryl-perry or use the QR code below:

Hugs 🤗 and thank you so much for supporting me in this effort and helping Sew Powerful to help these young girls to stay in school all month.

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Sew Powerful Purses #222-228 for 2026

Seven more purses to donate to Sew Powerful Purse Project. 

This flap is a string quilt block with added decorative machine stitching and a few buttons.

These 2 and the next 4 purses were made using small African panel prints and scrappy pieced around the panel. These 6 purses I made using black fabric prints and scraps.

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Garter Stitch baby Blanket

I knit this baby blanket using 3 different yarn colors: a solid pink, a solid blueish gray & a variegated colored yarn, alternating a color per row. It sure looks nicer than all one color. I donated this blanket to UNM Hospital for a baby. I am currently knitting another one exactly the same as this one. The yarn is acrylic and I plan on making as many baby blankets as I can using these yarns, but I may have to add another color or 2 with blanket number 3 when I finish with this one. Trying to use up the acrylic yarns that already I have. May make some baby quilts when the yarn is all knit up.

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Sew Powerful Purses #216-221 for 2026

Six more purses to donate to Sew Powerful Purse Project.

My friend Tara donated some fabric to me recently and I made these purses using some of the fabric she gave me. I added a starfish appliqué to each flap. The whale & dolphin fabric I used for the purses bodies and I made the straps using the fabric too. 

I used an Asian fabric for the bodies and one strap and scraps for the flap, along with other fabric scraps I had.

Tara had some pieces of sewn strips in the fabrics she gave to me, so I made a couple of flaps. I added some vertical strips to the sides of the flap on the right. I added some decorative stitching, yarn couching, rickrack and buttons for added interest. Thanks Tara for the fabric! I have some more purses to finish from other fabrics she gave to me.

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Sew Powerful Purses #213-215 for 2026

Here are 3 more purses I am donating to Sew Powerful Purse Project. All have an African woman canvas print that was meant to be framed, but I cut the height down to use as a flap and on the first one I also need to add some width to the flap, so I sewed some fabric to the sides and the back top of each flap. I didn't want any heads cut off 😜. I used up all the canvas prints on purses that I had now. 

I had a similar print to this I showed last time I posted. This one is showing her back instead of her front.

I love the colorful head piece.

This is my favorite one with this beautiful woman all the wonderful words printed all over it.

Here is the full flap to see as some of the top does fold to the back side.

The flap lining and the front pocket. I used a black fabric that I painted with paint sticks using a rubbing texture.

This photos shows the purse body fabric and the flap.

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Sew Powerful Purses #205-212 for 2026

8 purses to donate to Sew Powerful Purse Project. All are African women prints that were meant for framing. I cut down the height on them all so their heads wouldn't get cut off on the front and I added a strip of fabric to the back that doesn't show on the front.

I like the look of this print and the background color.

These and others below are silhouettes of women. I am finally using the black-orange-yellow print for the purse bodies. I have had that print for many years. It looks like an African print to me.

The print in the center has rhinestones in the print and I added some hotfix crystals over some of the print for extra bling, although you really cannot see it well in the photo, but it is pretty.

Her dress was full length before I had to trim it for the flap.

I like the animals in the background of this print.

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