Sewing for the Kitchen…

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UPDATE!   I used the cotton woven for my oven mitts which does have a small amount of spandex (3%) which could possibly lead to scorching more easily.  I’ve not had any issues so far as I’ve used them, BUT I have discovered that the canvas option from It’s Sew Creative is 100% cotton! So I will definitely use that for future mitts and recommend it if you are making mitts of your own.

TolkienpotholdersWM

While taking dinner out of the oven one night, and maneuvering my oven mitts so my thumb did NOT poke out of the huge hole, I made a mental note to pick up new mitts next time I went to the store as mine had clearly seen better days. But upon receiving this awesome Tolkien themed cotton woven fabric currently on preorder at It’s Sew Creative, I had the brilliant idea to try to sew mine own!

Lately I have been sewing with wovens again more and more.  There’s something very satisfying about sewing with a fabric that does not try to stretch as you stitch! I was a little nervous about sewing oven mitts with a strike off fabric as I’d never sewn them before and could not ruin my fabric, but they were incredibly easy!

Insul Bright

I began by printing out this free pattern by KylieKelsheimer found on Craftsy. I liked the fact that it is extra long to protect the arms. The link to the website with the tutorial was broken, however, there were pics that I could use to easily figure it out.  But I decided to sew mine a little differently after reading this blog post by Skip To My Lou.

I cut four layers for each mitt side just like she did, however, I used two layers of Insul Bright as I did not have any regular cotton batting on hand.  The Insul Bright instructions direct you to place the Insul Bright so that the shiny metallic side faces towards your heat source to direct the heat away from you.  So I layered my four rectangles lining piece (right side facing down), two layers of Insul Bright (metallic side facing UP) and outer fabric (right side facing up). I then pinned the layers together and stitched through all of them along the book outlines for a very basic quilted effect. I did not want to quilt through the books themselves and I found that stitching along the edges of the books gave just enough body to my mitts. I repeated this step so I had four quilted rectangles – two for each mitt.  I then placed two rectangles on top of each other (right sides together) and cut the pattern.  I sewed them together, clipped the edges, and turned right side out.  (I stitched around the outline twice to reinforce the seam as I was sewing so many layers.) Instead of the band like Skip To My Lou uses, I finished my oven mitts with double fold bias tape as they were already quite long.

And that’s it! Super easy! So easy, that I whipped up a matching potholder from my scraps extending the bias tape to form a small loop at the top to hang.

This cotton woven does have 3% spandex in it, and usually potholders are made from 100% cotton to prevent scorching under extreme temps.  So far I haven’t had any problems with them, but I’ll update as I use them more!

Insul Bright

Be sure to check out the current preorder at It’s Sew Creative!  There are several Book prints like the awesome Tolkien print I used as well as some adorable kids’ prints in multiple fabric bases!

Visit the current preorder at It’s Sew Creative here.

Visit It’s Sew Creative’s facebook group here.

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