Make your own pattern weights!
- By Bec Cooper
Are you a bit like me when cutting out your patterns and find yourself using the nearest heavy item to weigh down your pieces?
I could end up with a can of tuna, my mug of half-finished coffee, an apple or the whole fruit bowl laid out to keep my pieces in place.
Using a few small pieces of scrap fabric, you can whip up some stylish and practical pattern weights in next to no time!
What you need:
- Scrap fabric cut into 9” x 5” pieces (woven fabrics like canvas, cotton poplin or twill are best)
- Ribbon cut into 2” lengths
- Filling – I used clay cat litter (clean of course!) but you could use any type of small weighted pellet type filling like baking weights, rice, dried beans or small pebbles for example.
How to:
- Cut fabrics into 9” x 5” rectangles and ribbon into 2” lengths.
- Place the ribbon in the centre of one short side (right sides together) of your rectangle and clip into place.
- Fold the fabric, right sides together, so the short sides meet at the raw edges. The ribbon will be sandwiched between the fabric.
- Stitch along two raw edges, leaving one open, using a ½” seam allowance.
- Clip the corners, being careful not to clip through the stitching, and turn right sides out.
- Fold the edges of the opening into the centre by ½”, and iron flat. You can choose to fold them so you end up with a square bean bag style weight, or you can fold perpendicular to the seam where your ribbon is located to make a triangle bean bag like shown.
- Fill with your choice of weighted filling.
- Close the opening using a ladder stitch.
