Handmade Personalized Tea Towels

The boys and I made some personalized tea towels for gifts and had a lot fun in the process.  Actually, Daddy helped too.  He was the Transformers expert.  My five year old really got into it, creating Transformers designs.  I would love to take credit for this idea, but I saw it on a favorite blog, I Can Teach my Child.

To make these towels, you can purchase finished kitchen towels and attach the handmade design or make homemade towels.  I made homemade towels since I had lots of fabric on hand.  

Supplies needed:
Tea towels or fabric to make towels
Cotton fabric for artistic design
T-shirt (fabric markers)
Pinking shears
sewing machine

I bought two natural colored fat quarters and cut them each into 4 sections with pinking shears.  I needed 7 pieces of fabric for the boys to color.  I used pinking shears to help prevent raveling.  

The boys had a lot of fun coloring the fabric pieces.  Make sure to use t-shirt (fabric) markers so that the drawing will not wash out of the fabric.  

I used one of my towels as a pattern and cut the new towels out with pinking shears.  

I folded the edges over once and hemmed them.  I figured by cutting the fabric with pinking shears, I would reduce raveling so I didn't turn the edges under.  If you have time, I would turn the edges under.  

I pinned the artwork fabric to the tea towel and sewed it in place with a simple straight stitch.