Potential Realised

Someone forgot to tell me that using baby powder on babies is actually a thing of the past and people don't really do it any more. Somehow on the weekend, I came to the realisation that I'm the only one I know that uses baby powder. What are these other people doing? I wonder. Probably having to deal with nappy rash. But apparently, powder is considered a bit dangerous now days because you can inhale it accidentally, or something.

Meh. While I've been diligently doing an extra step during nappy changing time, those other people have been missing out on all the potential that comes from hoarding, I mean saving, the empty powder bottles. And now people, I'm excited to share to you that that potential has been realised! Hooray!

I give you, the Bowling Mat in a Bag!

So when I looked at the collection of baby powder bottles, the first thing that sprang to my mind was in fact a bowling set. Pretty uncreative really. I did, however, spend a long time pondering just how to make a bowling set that was easy to set up, and understand by a two year old.

See, I know lots of other kids who have bowling sets, but as far as I can tell they spend most of their time in their cases. Because bowling sets are hard to set up. You kind of need to be there for every minute of it. Helping kids to set up the pins, showing them where to go, making sure they stand back far enough, ensuring they don't overarm the ball at the pins excreta. It's not really a thing that kids can do on their own, (or none of the kids that have sets do it on their own that I know of).

So I spent lots of time thinking about how to make this accessible to kids. Easy for them to understand where the pins would go. Where they would need to stand. Where the ball would have to go in order to knock the pins down.

I knew I would make a bag for the pins to go in, and the obvious solution to many of the aforementioned questions about usability seemed to be able to be combated by an accompanying mat. Put dots at one end for the pins, put feet at the other. Pretty simple. But what if the mat got lost? How would I make this even easier for kids to use?

Enter the idea of sewing the mat into the bag. That's right people. I've now got a bag that is part of the game. Heck yes! Multifunctional! I know you are probably sharing my excitement right now and are on the edge of your seat waiting to see if I was actually able to achieve this fabulous vision. I'm more than delighted to tell you that indeed I did.

The mat part has scrap material spots on it to show kids where the pins go. The other end of the mat sews into the bottom of the bag. This means, that when the kids are emptying the pins (powder bottles) out of the bag, they will naturally pull the mat out too, and in the process turn the bag inside out. When they do this, they will see the brown shoe outlines sewn into the inside of the bag.

Pretty self explanatory from there. Pins on the dots, feet on the shoes, and roll the ball along the big yellow strip. And at the end of the game, shove everything back into the bag, the bag naturally turns back the right way and you pull the draw strings (easy for small children (and also for easy sewing purposes)) for a neat and tidy pack away.

You may be thinking that I'm spending a lot of words telling you about something rather simple, but I'm dam proud of what I've done. It took a lot of thinking. And I mean a lot of thinking to come up with the construction of the bag. If I hadn't thought as much as I did about it, I could easily have sewn the wrong thing first and had to do more unpicking than is ever desirable. (For the record, the amount of unpicking that is desirable is none. So any more than none is not a good thing.)

I was so proud of what I'd come up with in my head, that when I actually sewed the thing together last night, I went out of my way to do top stitching along the mat, to make it look even more amazing. There are also no exposed seams, and everything is lined. Steve thinks I could sell these. Or the pattern at least. But then I'd have to think even more about how to explain what went through my head to others. And be able to put all of that into words. Probably won't.