Candy Wrapper Zipper Pouch - less than successful (not quite a pin fail)

Cotton (the dog) and the Candy Wrapper Glasses Case

I'll refrain from calling this a Pin(terest) Fail, but it wasn't the roaring success I envisioned.  I saw these candy wrappers turned into zipper pouches and thought, "this would be so fun to do with a group of teens." Um, glad I tried it out first. And since then I've had no desire to try it out with a large group.

The basic idea is to use iron on vinyl (I found mine at a sewing machine store, but I've since seen it at Walmart) to laminate the candy wrapper. Then sew it into a pouch with a zipper across the long side.

Here's my first attempt:

Melted Vinyl and wrapper!

Good thing I was using a piece of fabric between the iron and the vinyl and then under the wrapper too! If a little heat is a good thing, more heat is better, right? Wrong!

The iron on vinyl makes the candy wrapper "fabric" sewable but like you are sewing vinyl (funny how that happens).

The hardest part of the project isn't ironing on the vinyl. It's actually turning the pouch right side out. Three of us completed (or attempted to) complete this project together. The Spree wrapper didn't make it past go. The Skittles wrapper attempt tore through the seam when turning right side out (too small), but the M&M wrapper made it to completion. The corners aren't nice and neat, but they are functional and the dog is still looking for the missing M&Ms!!

If you try this type of project here are my suggestions (learn from my mistakes):
 1. get the largest wrapper you can (it would make turning the project right side out easier)
 2. test out your ironing temp and duration on a scrap before using the real wrapper (more excuses to eat chocolate are always a good thing)
 3. don't consider this a beginner sewing project
 4. don't mentally consider this a fabric-like pouch, just pretend you are sewing a plastic pouch
 5. vinyl sticks to the sewing machine foot. I used tissue paper between my foot and my wrapper to solve this problem, but maybe putting tape on the bottom of the sewing machine foot would work as well? (anyone tried it?) Because I was using tissue paper I used small stitches so the paper would be nicely perforated and easy to tear off, but it also made the vinyl more perforated and easier to tear (bother).

Not so awesome results

So remember, not every awesome looking project will turn out awesome in real life, but have fun trying and remember that failure is an option and I'm not afraid to admit I failed on this project.

Awesome picture though! Thanks Katrina and Cotton for the pic.