Teddy Bear Hot Pad

I mentioned in the Barbie Fashion Doll Thrills post that I'd picked up a bunch of old crochet magazine patterns that were on sale at a vintage pattern site. One of the upsides of buying the whole magazine is occasionally I'm surprised by a project I hadn't noticed when I selected the magazine. In this case it was a Teddy Bear Potholder or in my case Hot Pad as I find these work great to set things on, not so great to try to pick things up with when they are hot.

This is a Michelle Wilcox pattern found in Annie's Quick and Easy Pattern Club April-May 1991 magazine. I used cotton dishcloth yarn for my project and followed the suggested hook sizes. I prefer cotton when I'm going to use heat on my projects. The downside to this is dishcloth cotton has more limited color selections. I would have preferred a lighter color as shown in the magazine for the baby bear. However, finding any brown locally has been challenging over the years. SO I used what I had on hand.

I used sport cotton for the eyes and Baby Bear's paw pads. I tried his paw pads with the pink dish cloth yarn and it was too heavy.

This will make for a nice summer hot pad. I have a few I can use for Memorial Day and July 4th but it is nice to have some summer fun themed ones as well.

Light Bulb Hot Pad

I've always liked holiday dishcloths and hot pads or pot holders. I find they are both practical and decorative. They add a little holiday color and feel without taking up valuable work space in my kitchen. I'm trying to test out some patterns this year to see which ones I like before seeing if they'd make good gifts.

I like this one, but I even in the picture of the pattern you will see it doesn't lay completely flat if that is an issue for you with hot pads. I was gifted one prior to this and I've found the little bump hasn't been an issue for keeping the pans balanced on top. The weight usually keeps the item flat.

You can purchase this pattern here. As I mentioned previously in a blog about Mary Maxim, e-pattern central has frequent sales. If you want this pattern and you have time to wait, I'd suggest waiting on one of their sales to pick up the pattern.

Springtime Patriotic Potholder

My husband purchased Scrap Potholders and Mats for me at Maggie's Crochet here. This has always been on my list of patterns to attack, but after working on the thread for the Texas Rose potholder I decided it would be fun to try working on a thread potholder.

I love this pattern. I used the magic circle for my potholder and it worked well. The only downside is at one point I tightened it too much and it did effect the look of the pattern. I'd work on that when I make this again. The big change I made was making bigger color wedges. I liked the outcome of this change. First I like bolder color stripes. Second it reduced the amount of ends needed to sew in at the end of the project.

This pattern used up some of my size 10 thread and has made me even more grateful for my Bates Bamboo thread hooks. I'm hoping to make one of these to donate for a kitchen charity basket.

This potholder will be on its way to a new home soon. The St. Patrick's Day bear is coming along and I'm hoping to have him finished soon.