Hot Water Bottle Cover

Hot water bottles are one of the best things to use to keep warm on a cold winter night. These cute, cuddly designs will prevent make your hot water bottle from causing minor scalds or burns, and encourage the kids to get into bed early.

- Hot water bottle

- Polar fleece blanket or fabric

- Coloured felt

- Template

- Fabric scissors

- Pins

- Sewing machine

Using a A3 piece of paper, draw the shape of the design that you want to make and cut it out.

To make sure my design was symmetrical I folded the paper in half and cut around the design.

In order to draw my shape the right size I first traced the hot water bottle that I was going to use and then drew the design around it

Pin the template to the polar fleece blanket and cut it out.

For the back template, trace around the top and bottom half of the front template separately (as seen in photo)

Make sure to add at least 3cm to the bottom of each so that there can be an overlap

Draw out the features of the face on a piece of paper and cut them out

Pin each feature onto the desired colour felt and cut it out

One at a time sew the features onto the dolls head, on the front piece (as seen in photos)

Add any further decorations using the same technique as you did with the face.

I chose to add a diamond and flower to brighten up my work.

To make my water bottle cover more sturdy I decided to add an inner lining to it

To do this I got a plain piece of cotton fabric

Place the front template onto the fabric, pin it and cut it out

Now that you have your lining piece, take the decorated piece and place it on top of the lining.

I found that the two fabric pieces stuck together well enough on there own, but if not it may be easier to pin them together

Do the same for the back pieces.

Using the templates previously created, cut out the lining pieces

Place the polar fleece pieces on top of the lining pieces, as seen above

Take both front and back and place them right sides together (as seen above)

Pin them in place

Using a sewing machine, sew around the outside

In this case it is not necessary to leave a gap as it can be turned inside out through the fold at the back

Cut triangle shaped notches around any curved edges

Turn the cover inside out through the opening in the back

To neaten the edges of the opening at the back, I used some embroidery thread to finish the edge with blanket stitch.

(To neaten the opening - You could also fold this edge over before stitching the front and back together)

Your hot water bottle cover is now ready for use, just slip the hot water bottle into the cover using the opening at the back

This method can be used to create many different hot water bottle covers. In addition to the babushka doll, I also made a simple cover.