Okay, so I only used a small part of a bicycle inner tube to make a phone case.

Next week I start training for a half marathon that takes place in November. I also decided to start using a fitness tracking application called Endomondo. To use Endomondo, I need to carry my phone with me on my runs which I’ve never done before because it’s big and I’ve not a found a good case for carrying it. At the Urban Assault Ride put on by New Belgium brewery, one of the schwag items we came home with was a little pouch made out of a bike inner tube which gave me this idea. The inner tube will help the phone stay dry while I sweat like crazy in the Texas heat. 

This weekend I decided it was time to make the phone case with the start of training on the horizon.  I grabbed an old mountain bike inner tube and cut off a piece of it. After my first attempt at making the case ended up just a tad too small, I succeeded on the second try.

One of the trickiest parts of this case was the zipper. I had to deconstruct a zipper so that it would be on continuous piece by folding it in half and putting each end into the zipper pull. You’ll see what I mean in the pictures at the end. 

First I cut the tube down the middle and washed it. Next, I sewed on the zipper to one side:

Next, I folded the zipper over and top-stitched it:

Then, I added the piece needed to put a strap through (normally I wear a dog leash around my waist, which is the best place to attach a phone).  Then, I folded it in half and sewed the bottom together.  I then had to turn it to the right side and try to attach the zipper pull, which turned out to be quite tricky the second time. After enlisting the help of pliers and my husband, I got the zipper pull attached and turned the case back inside out and sewed the smaller end together.

After that, I trimmed the edges near the seam and turned it right side out. Complete!

Some useful tips: rubber isn’t that hard to sew, but it’s tricky to get it to feed correctly through the sewing machine. I had to play with both thread tension and the foot tension to get it to work correctly.  Sewing through more than two layers  gets more difficult.

The average height of women in the US is 5’ 4”. I wish jeans makers would read that wikipedia article.

Anyhow, when I go jeans shopping, I get to look for the length “short” or shop in the petite section despite being fairly close to average height. On my last jeans shopping trip even the “short” jeans were way too long. They fit so perfectly every where else that I brought them home with me and decided just to wear them with heels. Unfortunately only my tallest heels could be worn which wasn’t very practical.

The solution? The internet. It taught me how to hem my own jeans. I found a number of sets of instructions but ended up following the instructions on the Cardigan Empire.  Luckily, despite my only mediocre sewing skills, I have a super fancy sewing machine given to me by my mom who used to work at a sewing machine company.

Pinning the jeans to the right length:

The sewing machine all set up with a zipper foot, the needle size for jeans, and some dark gray thread:

The finished product after ironing! I think they’ll do.

Molly enjoys watching the Steelers every weekend with us. When I jump up and down and cheer, she even barks along.  Two years ago when the Steelers were in the Superbowl I took an old terrible towel and turned it into a dog bandana (ok, maybe it’s more like a cape).  Don’t worry, I had other terrible towels and this particular one had been washed after a party where someone used it to mop up a spill. Obviously such a thing should never happen, but I made the best of the situation after the towel frayed a bit in the wash.

To turn the towel into dog wear, I folded under the frayed corners and sewed them under.

I also sewed a button on the front so Molly can dress quickly and easily at game time.

Here we go Steelers!