Adventures In Thermal Retention
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In my modest fabric stash (if by “modest” you understand that I mean it is not overflowing the containers I put it in), I recently found a jelly roll I’d forgotten about. Twenty strips of fabric, 2.5” wide by 45” long, in ten different patterns. All the fabrics were variations of purple and pink patterns with splashes of metallic silver just to add a little pizzazz. Or maybe bling, as the kids say these days. Really, quite pretty. I decided to use it to make a table runner for my favorite sister-in-law’s birthday and started by sewing all the strips side by side into a panel. Then, I cut the runner out of the panel on the bias at a 45° angle. Naturally, this left me with a number of scrap pieces, all in variously-sized triangles. I also had some fabulous Marauder’s Map fabric in the stash.
In thinking what use I might make of these scraps, I realized there was enough to make a rather pretty tea cozy with a Harry Potter-themed lining. (You could also use it to insulate a French press full of coffee—I’m not prejudiced against coffee-drinking Philistines.) I pulled out a pattern I’d previously used to make a tea cozy for my giant tea pot and got to work.
First, I made sure I had two layers of each fabric lined up with right sides together, and then I used my pattern to mark the fabric pieces. These are stitching lines, so I only needed to mark on one piece out of each pair, not both. Then I cut out the fabric pieces, leaving myself at least 1/2” of seam allowance. It was not necessary to be precise here, as I planned on trimming the seams later; I only had to make sure I had at least 1/2” of fabric outside the stitching line on all sides. I also needed some sort of batting. I had (left over from another project, obviously) some Pellon fusible interfacing that was plenty heavy enough to take the place of regular cotton batting, so I used that. I also chose to cut just inside the sewing lines for the batting to keep it out of my seams and reduce bulk. After I fused the Pellon to the wrong sides of my quilt pieces, I then chose to quilt each piece with the “stitch-in-the-ditch” method along each quilting seam.
Next I pinned the right sides together both of the quilted outer fabrics and the lining fabric and sewed along the stitching line I drew. I sewed along the curve only, leaving the straight edge open. I finger-pressed the seam open and then trimmed the seams with pinking shears, both to reduce bulk and to discourage raveling. Then I trimmed along the bottom edge of both pieces, 1/4” outside the stitching line I drew. I turned the lining piece right side out and tucked it inside the quilted piece, so right sides were together, and pinned. I marked about a 5” span that I would not sew, so I could turn the whole piece right-side out later. Then using a 1/4” seam allowance, I stitched around the perimeter of where the two pieces were nested together, leaving open the section of seam that I had marked.
I used the opening to turn the whole piece inside out and get the lining tucked inside the outer quilting. I pinned the new seam together in preparation for top-stitching. When I got to the opening, I carefully turned under the raw edges so that they lined up with the rest of the seam and pinned them in place. Then I top-stitched roughly 1/8” from the edge.
Pressed it and I was done! It’s just beautiful. I’ve displayed it here alongside the first cozy I made using the same method (minus the quilting part). Hard to say which is my favorite child…both of them will keep my tea drinkably warm for about 3 hours.
