Pot Holder Pocket {Week 21/52}

Get your scrappy strips ready for this weeks challenge… the scrap-busting Pot Holder Pocket.

This was honestly a fun project to work on. And fast. Fast is good, yes?

I used teeny strips of some of my favourite fabrics. By teeny, I mean 3/4” strips. Can you spot some Lecien Flower Sugar in there?

Over the weekend, I reviewed Kitchen Stitches – Kim from My Go-Go Life created the Too Hot to Handle Pot Holders featured in the book. They caught my attention and I just had to make one straight away.

This one is pieced first and then quilted which is great and it looks just lovely when finished.

As my pieces were a little ahem... thin… I decided to make my next Pot Handle Pocket using the quilt as you go method. It’s not normally a method of quilting which I use, but geez, for this little project, it was fun.

So here’s how I made the scrappy Pot Handle Pocket.

Start with 2 backing pieces measuring approximately 4” x 8”, two pieces of batting (if its thin batting, perhaps 4 pieces would be better), and some strips from your scrap tub.

Lay the backing fabric face down, with the batting on top and choose the first 2 strips you will use. Place the first strip right up against the edge of the batting and the second strip, on top of the first, facing down,with the edges aligned.

If you have a walking foot, now is the time to put it on your machine, but if you don’t have one, that’s fine too. I made one with a regular foot and the other with the walking foot.

Sew along the edge of the two aligned pieces, through all of the layers. Once the top two pieces are sewn down, flip the top one over and finger press.

* At the last minute, I decided to swap my two pieces over but didn’t get a photo *

Take the next strip and sew it down like the first 2, flip it over and finger press it. Take the next strip and so on… until you reach the end of the batting.

Now take your next piece of backing and batting and repeat the process.

As you can see from the image, I decided to have one side with vertical strips and the other with horizontal strips. I did think perhaps diagonally would be fun too, but might need to organise my scraps a little better before hand.

Now it’s time to make the template. There was a template in the book, but for some reason, my computer and printer weren’t playing nicely together, so I just made my own template. If you plan on making a few of these pot holder pockets, it might be a good idea to make it with some cardboard or template plastic.

To make my template, I drew a rectangle on a piece of notebook paper measuring 3 1/2” x 7 1/2”. I folded it in half longways and then cut a curve on one corner.

Lay the template onto the little patchwork quilted block and secure it with a pin if necessary. Cut around the template. Do the same for the other block.

Next step is to get a strip of fabric for binding. What this will do is hide the messy raw edge. My strip is 1 3/4” and I placed it over the flat end of my pieces and cut to size.

I place quilted piece face down and then line up the binding fabric face down, withe the flat edge. Sew with 1/4” seam. Repeat for the other quilted piece.

Flip over the binding fabric to the front, fold it under and top stitch it in place.

Now it’s time to put it all together. Line up both quilted pieces, with right sides facing and pin them together.

Sew around the edge, locking the stitches (or back stitching) at the start and at the end.

Turn out the Pot Handle Pocket and then top stitch all the way around. It’s quite bulky, but the walking foot helps get around it.

And here you have a cute, scrappy Pot Holder Pocket, ready to use next time you’re cooking dinner. As they’ll probably get a little bit dirty, make a few to have on hand when you need them.

If you make Pot Holder Pocket (or a dozen), please share your pictures in the 52 Week Scrap Challenge Facebook Page.

Be sure to follow me on Bloglovin’ (click the button below) so that you don't miss any of the future projects in the 52 Week Scrap Fabric Challenge.

Learn more about 52 Week Scrap Challenge here.

Previous 52 Week Scrap Challenge Projects:

Scrappy Heart Pincushion {Week 1/52}

Flutter By Needle Case {Week 2/52}

Fabric Covered Jars {Week 3/52}

Stitch a Dresden Pillow {Week 4/52}

Plastic Bag Dispenser {Week 5/52}

Life is Better With Friends : Mini Quilt {Week 6/52}

Electrical Cord Wrap {Week 7/52}

Sunny Mug Rug {Week 8/52}

Scrappy Quilted Trivet {Week 9/52}

Quilted Fabric Box {Week 10/52}