I love the idea of passing down sewing knowledge.  Mum (who was a couture designer in the 60s) taught me to sew as a little girl.  I grew up making cushions & bags and even won our local Young Enterprise competition at school selling drawstring bags.  I'd made the odd dress and pair of trousers for myself but never really gone further.  I never had the time with a busy, full-time job as a radio producer.  So the very best thing about starting Peak Princess has been sitting down with Mum and learning the art of pattern cutting, design and pattern making, and, of course, beautiful sewing.

Last year I taught Chinley 1st Guides to make hair scrunchies.  Though they were great I'd advise that they are actually quite fiddly and possibly a better project one on one that trying to teach twenty odd girls at once how to work out that fiddly bit of sewing the closure.  So this year, I took inspiration from Cloth Magazine's pattern for making drawstring shoe bags.  Super simple, near instant results and very pretty and customisable with different fabrics, ribbons and decorations.

Thankfully - with 26 girls - I had a couple of Mums as well as local fabric designer Kate Yorke (from Emily Pickle who makes my hair accessories) on hand to help with cutting, ironing and learning to use the sewing machine.  We split the group with half making cards wtih local linocut artist Jill Kerr and bead badges with another local bedding linen designer Rachel Child. 

Many of the girls were genuinely fearful of the machine*, never having used one before.  My approach is to acknowledge machines can be dangerous but with a bit of respect they are easy to master and you are always in control.  Most of them took to it like ducks to water and the look of amazement on their faces when they turned the bags inside out and realised they'd made something was priceless.

(*It was also interesting to get to use the John Lewis mini sewing machine (£49).  It's great value and the speed is nice and slow but personally I think the horizontal bobbin deck made threading very fussy and it seemed to come unthreaded and lose tension quicker than the grown-up machines.  That said, I'm a massive John Lewis fan and do all my Peak Princess sewing on their basic Janome machines).  

   I'm not sure they believed me when I told them that now they'd mastered the drawstring bag they had learnt all the basic skills you need to make cushions, curtains and even a halterneck dress.  Perhaps that's next year's class!

PS I'd really recommend buying any child who shows a creative streak a subscription to Cloth magazine (just £12 a year) or go on their website's project page.