Square Hot Pot Holder

The other part of my Friday Challenge was to make something using an old pair of jeans.  This is what I came up with...

1.  OK, so this first bit has nothing to do with my old jeans!  Cut a square of cotton 9 inches by 9 inches.  I had a few scraps of this tea cup fabric left over from some coasters that I made for Christmas presents last year so I stitched them together to get my square.

2.  Cut an 9" x 9" square from your old jeans.

3.  You'll also need an 9" x 9" square in heavy duty wadding.  If you haven't got the really thick stuff you could also use a couple of layers of less weighty wadding.  I got mine from Fabricland in Brighton and I've been assured that it is 'combustion-modified', which basically means it won't burst into flames.  Pretty crucial for an oven mitt.

4.  Once you have these 3 squares layer them as follows: wadding, cotton fabric right side up, denim square right side down.  Pin.  Using a 1/2 inch seam allowance stitch 3 sides of the square.

5.  Trim corners and seams and turn inside out.  Press.

6.  Turn the open seam inwards half an inch, press and pin.  In one corner I tucked in a folded piece of 1 inch wide fabric braid to form a hook.

7.  Once pinned in place top stitch around the whole of the square about 5mm in from the edge.  This will close up the open seam and hold the tag in place.

The dress formerly known as daddy's shirt!

And yes - don't worry - daddy did know about it!

What's great about this is that most of the hard work has already been done!

1.  Find a dress that fits your little one.  You will use this as your stencil for the outline of the dress. 

2.  Place this dress on top of the shirt - lining up the collar/neck line.  Using tailor's chalk draw the outline of the dress on the shirt.  Be sure to make it wide enough around the waist, bottom and skirt.  Mine could have done with being a bit wider as the orange dress is made in a much stretchier fabric.  I realised too late!

3.  Being sure to add a seam allowance, cut out the shape of the dress in the shirt.  I'm going to use a french seam which will require twice the amount of usual seam allowance for your side seams (not the arm holes).

4.  Pin and stitch the side seams of the dress.

I've used a french seam here.  This is neater and feels smoother against the skin!  To do this line up the seams wrong sides together.  Pin and stitch both side seams.  Trim excess seam allowance.  This feels counter-intuitive as initially your raw seam is on the outside of your dress.  Now turn inside out and press.  Pin the seams again and stitch using the same seam allowance.  The seam will now be on the inside of your dress and is a very neat finish.

5.  Pin and stitch bias binding around the arm holes.  To ensure a neat finish allow for a little overlap and be sure to fold and press the ends of the binding before pinning in place.

I've made my own binding but your local haberdashery should have a good selection, including pretty patterned binding.

6.  Pin and stitch bias binding around the bottom hem of the dress.  This really neatens it up and looks very sweet if it matches the binding used for the arm holes.

It's that straight forward!  I'm now hoping that Ben will be having another clear-out soon!

I didn't get the chance yet but I think that changing the buttons over to these will make this dress extra sweet!