Heya people! first tutorial! yay!!!!Today I'm going to posting a tutorial on how to make potholders. These can be used for taking items out of the oven, for placing hot dishes on top of so that they don't damage the counter/table. If you use pretty fabric, they can also be used as decoration.
Materials:
flannel (enough to make two 9" squares)
Fleece, or felt. (enough to make two 9" squares)
thread
sewing machine (you could also try sewing them by hand, but I don't think that would work out very well.)
scissors
bias tape
pins
iron
opt: rotary cutter (This helps for making straight edges. If you don't have one of these, just make sure you cut the fabric extra carefully.)
alright. First, take the fabric, and iron it all. Make sure it's flat. Then, cut out an 9" by 9" square, out of paper, to use as a pattern... or, just measure right onto the fabric. Cut out two squares of flannel, and two squares of either fleece, or felt. You're going to make a sandwich, with the flannel acting as the "bread" and the felt or fleece as the "filling".
next, take a ruler, and, using a pen (or pencil, or marking pencil), make a large "X", going from corner to corner, for all the corners. Then, measure in from the edge, one half inch, and mark where it touches the X. Do this for all four corners. (note: make SURE you pin the fabric all together before this next step!!!) Now, take the fabric "sandwich" which is pinned together, and sew right down that X. do one diagonal, then do the other one.
Remember those marks on the "X" I told you to make? well, start at one of them, and sew to the next one. Then, to the next one, and the next one, until you've sewn a square.
Ok! You could use it just like this. But it doesn't look as finished, and it'll have a tendency to fray, or fall apart. So, we use bias tape. Bias tape is basically a long piece of fabric, with the sides pressed into the center. You're going to un-fold the right flap of fabric. (I mean, it's on the right side, not the left.) take the edge you've unfolded, and place it so that where the fold is when the side is pressed to the middle, is a little to the right side of that square of stitching.
Just sew the bias tape around, like that. If you're going to make a tab for the potholder, sew it under the bias tape.Make sure you go in a full square. Then, if there is any extra fleece/felt poking out, trim it. (note: make sure you don't cut the stitching. o.O that would be bad.) You should also trim the corners- that way it's less bulky, and easier to sew.When you're done with that, flip the bias tape over the edge of the fabric. You don't have to unfold the other flap of bias tape, just fold all of it over. this shouldn't be too hard. If it doesn't fit over the top, you may want to make sure there isn't any extra fleece/felt. Then, and this is the part I hate, sew it on the other side. You're going to want to go slowly, otherwise it gets hard to keep folding it. If you accidentally sew off of the bias tape, just keep going, and re-sew that part when you're done. don't worry. (I did that for all of the pot-holders I made my grandma for Christmas.) When you're done, ta-da, you have a pot holder. :D yay you!
If you have any questions, or need me to explain a step further, please comment. :) thanks!
