How to make your own face potholder, part one

Just in case you are eaten up with jealousy at my vintage style pot holders, here is how I have been making them. I am not an expert, despite what I tell my kids, so there may well be better ways of doing things. This is just how I do it. I use a piece of pink fabric for the face color, because don't stock any plausible skin tones in my stash. You will also need four scraps of batting, as big as your plate pattern, a piece of jeans or heavy weight fabric for the back, and a four inch wide strip of bandanna color fabric, cut from the width of your goods.

I used a salad plate, about 8 inches across. I start by just cutting the skin fabric, and then use the embroidered face as the guide for cutting the rest.

To determine face placement, fold into quarters and crease.

The eyes go on the center line, half way down the face. Keep the mouth small, even smaller than this, for a vintage look. The nose is indicated by two dots. Embroider the features, or fabric paint or fuse or whatever you like to do. I used six strands of floss ( the whole strand, as it comes from the little hank.) I like this for the eyes and mouth, but next time I will either use size 8 Perle Cotton or divide the floss, because I think it looks like she has on too much eye makeup.

This how to is spread out over three posts, because Blogger and I have a disagreement about how many photos should be in a post!