Take Along Patterns

Don't you hate when you get to the fabric store and either you don't know how much fabric you need or you see a fabric but can't really think what pattern it would go with? Here's my solution.

I bought a couple of 99 cent, plastic photo albums. I went online to each pattern website and copied the pattern photos into my photo software then printed them out on 4x6 photo paper. On the front I wrote the size range that I have and identified the different views.

I also printed out the pattern backs. Simplicity and New Look patterns are the best b/c you can cut them down to almost exactly 4x6. There is a little bit of maneuvering and the very edges might get cut off, but no more extra work is needed. Then I just glue sticked them onto the back of the pattern photos.


All the others need some work. For Butterick, McCall and Vogue I copied and pasted into a 2 column word document and eliminated as much of the info as I could. This took a lot of work. For the Jalie patterns, I just printed it out as it is, cut it down as small as possible and folded it and stuck it in behind the photo.

This is handy ya'll! I have one photo album for the girls and one for me. Now I just need some ideas on how to do this for the Ottobre patterns. I did think of printing out the pdf of all the patterns in each issue, and cutting them out and pasting them onto cardstock. But how do I get all the yardage info on? I'd have to hand write it or re-type it. If you have any ideas, let me know. And yes, I do need to know all the yardage requirements for all the range of sizes b/c I might feel like making something for some child other than my own.