Wallets as Piggy Banks-- the Hardest Working Wallets of All!

During the month that Piece Work's studio has been closed for the holidays, I've been traveling around the northeast visiting family.  As usual, I was curious about the state of any wallets we had planted there.  Last spring when I was in New Hampshire, two of my little grandsons had wanted me to make wallets for them.  This was nine months ago, and theirs is a very active and relaxed household, so I was stunned to learn that they still had both wallets in their possession, and that, amazingly, both kids knew exactly where they were!

These wallets were definitely cases of field surgery, so I was really surprised to see that they looked about the same after nine months of very hard use.  I had had no sewing machine or patterns or anything else I usually use to make a wallet.  The kids had wanted Kettle wallets just like one I was carrying at the time.  So we went to the co-op and bought two bags of blue-flavored Kettle chips.  I approximated a pattern and used dental floss to sew the wallets.  The boys both wanted small notebooks but no coin purses or credit card cases.

You can imagine my surprise the other day when six-year-old Luca showed me his wallet, which had no closing elastic or button (his choice) but was somehow managing to carry about ten dollars in coins (I think gravity was holding it together) and a gift card for a bookstore.  Then eight-year-old Tallis brought his wallet in.  He had asked for a button and tie, which we had made out of some yarn, and his wallet still looked pristine and new.  Inside he had his life savings-- $25 in one-dollar bills.  He also had a gift card tucked away.  When we went to Borders' to cash in the gift cards, the boys lugged their wallets and pulled them out to pay, augmenting the gift cards with cash from their wallet-banks.