Sewing: Apprentice

My eldest daughter has been learning to sew this past year. She stared with a couple simple baby blankets and last Christmas made a couple quilted hot pads. This Christmas she was ready to make some on her own. I am excited to share her adventures with you!

For this project, she starts with an irregular polygon cut from her main fabric.

Then, she pins it on a base fabric that will not be seen on the finished product. For the hot pads, she used 8 1/2 inch squares, but this could be modified larger for pillows or quilt squares and assembled for a large quilt.

From here, she takes a strip of coordinating fabric and pins it to the shortest side of the polygon and sews them together to the base fabric, presses it open, and then continues around the other sides working out until all the base fabric is covered.

Next, she has mom help trim up the sides, then she sandwiches the quilted top and a coordinating backing fabric with an insulated lining, a special batting (Insul-Brite). She sews around the hot pad, turns it and top stitches the opening closed.

Once it is all completed, she finishes it with a decorative stitch around the center fabric.

I am so excited to see her growing in her creativity and independence. She had so much fun making these and great joy in giving them! Did you make any gifts this past year? I would love to hear about them!