Catching Critters! A Fun DIY Bug Bag

You can’t beat bug hunting for kids’ summer fun. Make this bag with your Brother embroidery machine and they will be kept busy prowling the bushes and grass. Whether the prey be creepy crawlies or fireflies, the adventure is a child’s version of a jungle safari. But where to put the catch? This fiberglass screen wire teepee bag (the name suggested by its shape) is a perfect accessory and holding pen. Use insect designs from iBroidery.com
and your personal design library to embellish the outside. Your Brother embroidery machine
handles the screen wire effortlessly. The stand-alone butterfly swaying inside the bag will intrigue the children and send them racing out the door into nature.

Requirements:

• Brother sewing/embroidery machine
  
• Open Toe foot,
  J foot
  
• 4x4 or 5x7 frame to embroider more than one design in the same frame
• Fiberglass screen wire: 18 x 26” for bag embroidery and another large piece for stitch rehearsal of each potential design.
• Utility scissors for cutting screen wire and zipper
• Notions: zipper at least 18” or with plastic teeth. Longer is fine. It will be cut to size during construction; 8-10” cord or ribbon; monofilament, sewing and embroidery thread, seam sealant
• Extra heavy water-soluble stabilizer (wss)

Templates to Download:

• Template is 8.5" x 18"
• Download both left and right files below and piece together.
• layout template left
  
• layout template right
  

Templates look like this:

Designs:

• Beetle
  from iBroidery.
• Tiny bee/firefly
  from iBroidery. Extract a single bee
• Ant-in Brother card Summertime reduced 20% (or use any kind of insect from BES 4,
  iBroidery
  or your own design library)
• Dragonfly from BES 4
  
• Ladybug on Daisy Stem
  from iBroidery. Extract ladybug
• Baby Piglet & Snail
  from iBroidery. Extract the snail.
• Bumble Bee
  from iBroidery. Reduce bee by 20%
• Ethereal Butterfly
  from iBroidery.
• Any insects in your design library

Preparation

1. Print pattern/design templates. It is broken into two parts because my scanner bed is too small for the entire template. Print both the left and right templates and tape them together. 2. Print template of each design you plan to use. If deemed appropriate, resize to be proportional to the bag. 3. Cut 18 x 26” screen wire. This large size makes hooping easier. 4. Tape completed template to white surface or pin to padded surface. 5. Center screen wire over template and tape or pin corners to hold in place. 6. Trace section placement lines onto screen wire with child’s “school” chalk. These lines show each section of the finished bag for suitable embroidery placement. 7. Place templates of selected embroidery designs in chosen location within the section. 8. Wind bobbin in each thread color used in the designs.

Embroidery

9. Select one or two designs to embroider on one large side and load into machine. 10. Hoop screen wire and heavy-duty water-soluble stabilizer (wss). Puckering occurred when the screen wire was simply basted to the wss. 11. Touch the CAMERA icon, boxed in green at the top right of the screen in image # 5. Scan the hooped screen wire. 12. Call up your first design—the ant for this example. Use the stylus to drag the ant to the desired location. 13. Touch the Add icon boxed in orange at the bottom left of the screen. Bring in another design or however many you wish to add to that section of the bag. Drag each in place with the stylus. After embroidery, do not remove wss. 14. Continue hooping and embroidering each section. The wss is still in place on the back. Do NOT embroider the ladybugs now.

Construction

Insert the zipper in this unorthodox manner, stitched flat on the top side of the screen wire. This is done so the ladybugs could be embroidered along the zipper edge. 15. Attach open toe foot. The zipper is placed on top of the screen wire. 16. Open the zipper, place the top of the tape at the top of the bag’s marked cutting, right side up with the teeth at the edge of the left marked bag side. 17. Straight stitch 1/8-1/4” from zipper teeth, with open toe foot positioned along the edge of the teeth. Needle position is in far right. 18. Open the zipper as far as possible. Repeat on the opposite side. WSS is still in place. 19. Stitch ‘grass’ for ladybugs' home. Select stitch #7-12, width 6.5, length 4.0.

Return to Embroidery

20. Open ladybugs design. Hoop with zipper near center of frame. Scan the frame and position design. Embroider. 21. Hoop 2 layers of wss in 4x4 frame. Embroider butterfly. This one was resized up to 2.56 x 2.55”. Be sure to use matching thread in the bobbin. 22. Remove as much wss as possible then soak in tepid water until the edges are clean. What remains between the layers will give the free flying butterfly stability. Pat with paper towels to help it dry. When almost dry, shape it with wings spread as if to fly. The antennae are just loose threads. Applying a bit of seam sealant gives them some body.

Return to Construction

23. Cut screen wire to 8x16”, along marked chalk lines but do not cut zipper. Best to remeasure for exact sizing. Leave zipper open to its greatest length. 24. Remove as much wss as possible. Trim screen wire and wss from teeth edges to first line of stitching. 25. Immerse bag in tepid water to dissolve wss. 26. Lie flat on a towel and roll the towel around it, like a burrito. Squeeze out excess moisture and hang to dry. If you are in a rush, a blow dryer speeds up the process of drying the zipper tape. 27. Stitch a folded 8-10” cord or grosgrain ribbon to the top edge within the ¼” seam allowance. The loop should hang down with raw edges extended a little beyond the seam allowance. This creates a loop handle. 28. Close zipper a few inches above the bottom raw edge. Fold the bag inside out with the closed zipper in the center of the seam line. Stitch with ¼” seam allowance right over zipper. 29. Cut excess zipper-finally! Use utility scissors. 30. Fold top in half with zipper at one side. Begin stitching at zipper just above the first tooth. Back stitch for reinforcement. Angle up to ¼” seam line. The open toe foot gives best visibility for those first stitches. The top corner has been cut away to reduce bulk. 31. Insert a length of monofilament into the shaped butterfly. Place it inside the bag and stitch it to the top seam, leaving the butterfly suspended. Does this make you want to hunt bugs or to sew a bug bag?