Card Holder

I've been needing a new holder for my Oyster card (payment card for the London Underground trains) for a long time. I go through these plastic ones at a rate of about one a year, and they're just not pretty. 

So I decided to cut in to one of my lovely Lecien fabrics. I used this tutorial from The Crafty Cupboard, which is really for business cards, but works just as well for this. 

I cut out all the necessary pieces, opting to go for fewer different fabrics than the original. 

Folded, pressed and topstitched a double hem onto the pockets.

Pinned the pockets to the lining. Ironed the fusible fleece to the top layer and pinned it, right sides together to the lining piece. I inserted a small hair tie for closing purposes. Then sewed all the way around, turned inside out and used an invisible stitch to close the gap. It was around this point that I realised that the metal part of the hair tie was now on the outside. So I cut it off and sewed it back together. Not sure how well this will hold with time, but the metal part made it difficult to close. I then sewed on a button (I agonised over which button to use for ages, but decided the blue went well with the blue flowers on the fabric). 

Now I have a much prettier holder for my Oyster card, and hopefully a much more hard-wearing one!