Thursday, October 14, 2010

Handmade gift ideas..Corn Bags for hot or cold therapy and coasters

Judy at Patchwork Times is asking for ideas for handmade items. Here are a couple I have used more than once.
http://www.patchworktimes.com/2010/10/14/handmade-gift-ideas/#comment-48016

 Corn Bags for hot or cold therapy
I have made dozens of these. I made 50 a couple of years ago for my Mother to give as Christmas gifts to the staff  at the Nursing Home where she lived. I just helped organize a sewing and craft day for my work and we made them there. This site does a better job than I ever could about explaining the technique and supplies. Basically, 1 yard of muslin, 1 yard of  fabric (I like flannel) and a 50# bag of whole feed corn makes 8 bags with corn left over for 15 more. I think the cost to make is about $2 each. I used $1.99 muslin, $2.99 flannel, and paid $16 for the bag of corn. I print a slip with instructions and staple it to the corner. Neighbor gifts, hostess gift, teacher, work exchange, secret pals,....
http://www.netwrx1.com/~diamond/microwave_heating_bags.htm

Coasters
My second thought is not fabric related. I have made a lot of coasters, too. A box of 4 inch tiles from a home improvement store, some cork, (I used cork tiles cut into squares with my old rotary cutter) a couple rubber stamps and some permanent ink. $1 apiece to make.
http://paisleyscraps.blogspot.com/2007/09/tumbled-tile-coasters.html

1 comment:

jayayceeblog said...

Love the corn bag idea and the coasters are just plain gorgeous!