Hand Warmers

Holding My Heart in the Palm of Your Hand

Happy Monday, everyone! This weekend was the perfect cure for my busy week. I had dinner and drinks with friends on Friday night and just relaxed all day Saturday. Due to my trying week, my cute little husband bought and scheduled me a massage yesterday. It was so wonderful and so sweet of him!

This weekend was so great because our "non-busy" weekends have been few and far between for the past six months. And now, we are gearing up for the holiday season! I'm looking forward to Thanksgiving in a few weeks. Jeremy and I are most likely hosting for my parents and sister's family (pending news of my dad's heel. He broke it while working around the house...OUCH!!!).

Our biggest task this weekend was watching our friend's dog, Fate. She lives downstairs, and her and Mosby are best buddies.

I was so busy relaxing, I didn't start on my project this week until yesterday evening. I started, then things went quickly downhill. My machine kept jamming. I kept swearing. Jeremy kept nervously glancing towards me. Mosby kept sleeping (in his defense, he was tuckered out from playing with Fate all weekend).

I decided to give up for the evening. It was a good decision.

I finished up our hand warmers today. They would have been nice for our chilly change of weather today, but we survived.

Here's what I did.

I started with some scrap fabric.

I folded the fabric in half, much like you would in elementary school to make a heart. I cut out four hearts (two for each hand warmer).

sorry for the blurry photo

Then, I sewed two hearts together, leaving just about a quarter inch of opening along one edge, near the tip of the heart. I didn't bother with sewing the "wrong sides" together and flipping the heart inside out so you couldn't see the seams. It would have been nearly impossible to flip such a small piece of material without leaving one side completely unsewn.

Next, I fashioned a little cone out of paper and a little masking tape. I poured rice into my cone. I then put the cone in the heart and filled it up! 

When each heart was filled, I hand sewed the opening. You COULD use your machine, however, a friend of mine accidentally broke a non-removable, thus non-replaceable, part of her machine when her needle ran over some dried food, while working on a similar project. She had to replace the whole sewing machine. I think hand sewing is a much safer choice.

Ta-da! There you have it! Pop these little babies into the microwave for 30 seconds before you leave in the morning and you have warm hands for your commute.

I made a pair for Jeremy and myself. We are public transit commuters, and I know these will come in "hand-y" (ha, get it??) this winter.

Until next time, keep crafting!

SB