Sewing Project: Shower Caddy

Livia and Carol cruising aboard s/v Estrellita 5.10b have a little project that any tropical cruiser is going to love...

So, perhaps a bit of TMI, but we are cockpit shower-ers. In close quarters with other boats we wear swimsuits or wait for dark, and when not in close quarters with other boats, as we like to say “What you see with binoculars is your own damn fault”.

After years of dealing with shampoo and soap bottles jammed into the small opening where our cockpit shower exits the cockpit combing, with our new sewing machine I made a caddy for our stern pulpit using Sunbrella, a UV resistant mesh product like Phifertex and some 2” velcro. I measured the distance between bars, added the circumference of the bars (twice) and velcro width (four times) and seam allotment (twice) and that was the length of the sunbrella fabric to cut. For the width I measured between our dinghy engine hoist and dinghy engine bracket (plus seam allotment – twice). After that I was really free handing the mesh and the pockets look a little lumpy close up. Good enough for us!

Inside the caddy fit 4 reusable squeeze bottles I picked up at REI.

Sometimes it is the little boat improvements that are the most exciting. Our cockpit transformation is 2/3 of the way done: cockpit cushions (check), shower caddy (check) and now we need new mesh pockets near the dodger to replace our shredded ones.