Guest Post - Hot/Cold Rice Sacks

The talented and exceptional Faith agreed to do a guest post with me. So be sure to check out her blog (I also did a guest post for her)!


Hi, I'm Faith, from In All Faithfulness, and I'm really excited to share with you one of my favorite (and most successful) DIY's. 

I love these little sacks because they're great for so many things, from stomach aches​ and headaches to pocket warmers. The idea is simple, place it in the freezer for cold, or in the microwave for heat. 

While it works best to have a sewing machine, this can definitely be done by hand sewing. (I don't have a sewing machine on hand, so I have to hand sew all of mine.) While hand-sewing is a bit more time consuming and may not look quite as polished in the end, it will, by all means, function just the same!

Okay, let's get started. Here's the supplies you'll need:

-A bag of rice

-Fabric  

-Needle & Thread (or sewing machine)

Your fabric can be almost any size or texture, I like these little sheets that you can find at Walmart for around $1. It's enough to make several small - medium sized sacks. 

Note: you don't have to buy fabric for it, you can use almost anything. For example, socks, t-shirts, towels, washcloths, etc.

Your next step is to decide what size to make it. Once you get that figured out, cut out double the size of what you want your finished product to be, so that you can fold it in half and sew it.

Now, fold it in half with the pattern on the inside. This is so the stitching will look cleaner when we flip it inside-out again to fill it with rice. If you sew it with the pattern on the outside, your stitching will be visible, whereas if you sew it inside-out, then flip it back out again, it will look much nicer. 

Now, to sew it, you want to find the crease, where you folded it in half, and start in one of the corners next to that. In the picture above, the crease was on the right side, and I started sewing there. Make your stitches close together, because you don't want any little pieces of rice falling out. Keep sewing until you have about an inch or two of opening left, and set it aside to fill. (Note, the bigger your sack the bigger you'll need the opening to be).

Here's what it looked like when I finished sewing it. (I had another rectangular blue one that was ready to be filled up that I'm going to continue with now.) 

With your little 1-2 inch opening, turn the sack inside-out so the pattern is now on the outside. Here's what it should look like:

As you can see, the stitches look much better on this side. 

To fill the sack with rice I like to use a funnel, but it works without one too. You can use a measuring cup, a spoon, your hand, or just pour it in directly from the bag. 

Fill it up about halfway. 

After it's filled, finish sewing the top and tie it off. (To do this, insert the needle in, but don't pull the loop through all the way. Instead, run your needle through the loop. Do this a couple times in the same stitch before cutting your thread.) 

Here's what it should look like! I made this one a long, rectangular shape so that it would work best for stomach aches.

For a no-sew option: You can actually take a knee sock (which can be found at the Dollar Tree), fill it with rice, and simply tie it at the end. This is a quick no-sew option if you don't have time to sit down and make one.

That's all there is to it! I hope you enjoyed this tutorial, thanks for reading along!

~Faith