Tutorial - Make a Buckwheat Bag

Many people have made these soothing heat bags with rice, but I made some today with buckwheat. For the covers, I enjoyed using up some scrap fabric.  A fat quater will yeild you two bags.   If you don't have any buckwheat, you can buy it from the Co-op farm supply on the north side, just past the Pizza delight.  It is $1.10 per pound, and it takes about a pound per bag.  I'm sure you could get it cheaper if you bought a bigger bag.  I got a couple of good suggestions to use these bags from yesterdays commenters.  Do you have any different uses for them?  

Here's how I made them.   



Start with a 9" x 18" piece of quilters cotton and about 3 cups of buckwheat.



Iron down one of the short ends by about 1/2 inch.

Fold the piece in half  with right sides together and pin.

Sew the long raw edge, and the short raw edge, leaving the short folded edge open.



Fold in quarters like an accordian.   Give a good press to really set in the creases.



Through the open end, fill with 3/4 cup of buckwheat and shake into the bottom quarter of the bag. 

With the buckwheat safely in the bottom section, stitch along the first crease.

You might want to use pins to hold the buckwheat out of the path of the stitching needle.

Continue adding 3/4 cup of buckwheat and then stitching until all four sections are complete.

Done.

Add a scrappy bow and add a note to microwave for 1 minute.  Then apply to neck area for a warm soothing rest.