Randy

Amy:
Our quilt teacher had each of us make our own Christmas gift from her after our last quilt class. She had us make our own potholders and they were cute, quick and our 6 year old has made them!

To Make one potholder you will need:

6 (8 inch square) blocks in whatever Christmas fabric you have
(one of these blocks, the INSIDE block will never show so it can be
anything at all)

1 (8 inch square) InsulBrite or any other heat resistent material
(someone mentioned using old towels for padding..that works!)

Lay 1 square of fabric face DOWN
Lay 1 square of padding or InsulBrite on top
Lay 1 square of Christmas fabric FACE UP
Pin this "sandwich 2 inches from each edge.

Now, with each of the remaining 4 (8 inch squares) fold them in half corner to corner to form a triangle. Lay the raw edge of the triangle at the corner of the sandwich then turn the potholder and lay the next triangle in until you have arranged all 4 triangles around the square. Pin each triangle to the original squares to hold securely while you sew around the edges of the potholder. I hope the attached pictures will help you understand what I'm describing.

After all 4 corners are sewn around the edges turn the potholder right side out and Joila! You have a nice potholder. You can sew a plastic or metal ring on back the potholder for a hanger or if you use bias tape on the outside of the potholder you can make a loop in the bias tape to hang the potholder.

I make these as coasters using a 5 inch set of squares. They are really cute, too.

Also, you can cut the squares in CIRLES and do the same thing to make round wine glass coasters/glass identifiers. Lay the 4 folded circles around the base circle sew then turn right side out. Slip the bottom of the wine glass into the coaster folds and Joila! you have a traveling coaster that stays attached to the wine glass AND you have a wine glass identifier if you make each coaster of a different color or fabric combination.
Good luck and enjoy!
Randy