The last stage is to do the binding and here my first attempt was a mistake and I had to unpick it. I used ordinary quilt binding - and it didn't give me enough edging to join the sides together. The quilt sandwich is quite stiff now and I needed a wide soft edge that would allow me to make the envelope and be able to stitch the sides together. I'll show you what I mean ... as once I made a 4" binding, it made more sense.
I stitched the binding down by hand on the inside of the cover and then machined it too, to make sure it was absolutely flat and then made my envelope, carefully ensuring that my macbook would fit inside snuggly. I machine stitched the sides, twice. I know this has to be durable and will be bumped about and pulled in and out of a totebag, so having put in so much effort to make something original - I wanted to be sure it would work on a functional level.
Finally the fastening - this was problematic. The whole thing was starting to remind me of a modern take on a Victorian 'botanical'notebook case and I rather liked the idea of closing it with a tie, like those old fashioned journals. I rummaged around in my buttonbox and found this sort of toggle, which seemed like a good idea, except it was completely flat on the bottom and if I had just sewed it on, it would have lain too flat to wind a cord around. I thought maybe elastic was a good idea. I never buy elastic......mmmmm - out of the corner of my eye, I spotted my mum's little sewing drawers which sit in my sewing room - inside, of course, were all sorts of useful bits and bobs, including 6 different sizes of elastic (what is it about that generation - "always be prepared") Yay! It worked a treat. I threaded it through the toggle and stitched it onto the front of the cover. I made some matching cord, by using a strip of fabric 2" wide, folded in on each side to the middle, folded again and then folded again and machine topstitched to hold it in place.
Finally it all came together.
