How to Make Heat-Resistant Mini Oven Mitts

Don’t you hate big bulky oven mitts or potholders? Mini oven mitts are so nice. I’ve had this mini oven mitt for many years and absolutely love it. It’s my go to potholder. One of my boys used it to remove something on the grill. In his defense, I reached into the drawer and gave it to him. As you can see, the grill was a little hard on it.

Sometimes you just need a little incentive to create something. How nice would it be to have a set of these? I’ve thought that several times as I was removing a hot dish from the oven. As simple as these mini oven mitts are, I’ve never made any!

Insul-Bright

In the list below, you’ll see that one important thing you need is Insul-Bright, which is a needle-punched insulated lining. Insul-Bright is heat resistant but not heat proof. It has a metalized film that reflects heat. Since there is metal in it, it is not recommended for use in the microwave. This product is good for insulating hot or cold foods.

For oven mitts, you can sandwich the Insul-Bright between two layers of cotton batting or you can use only one layer of cotton batting to make it easier to sew. You’ll want to be sure the cotton batting is on the side closest to your hand when in use.

Supplies Needed for Mini Oven Mitts

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Cotton fabrics (Avoid synthetic fibers)
Cotton thread
100% Natural Cotton Batting
Insul-Bright Batting
Scissors
Basting Spray, and straight pins, or Sewing clips,
Sewing Machine
Walking foot
Disappearing Ink Pen or Pencil or Painter’s Tape
Iron
Ironing board or felt ironing mat
Double fold bias tape
PDF Download and print the pattern

Directions for Making Mini Oven Mitts

Wash and Dry the Fabric

The first thing you want to do before sewing cotton fabrics is to wash and dry the fabric. If the fabric is going to shrink, you want it to shrink before you begin to sew your project.

Iron the Fabric

Then, iron to smooth out any wrinkles in the fabric. Remember the felt ironing mat for a counter or tabletop that I’ve used in several small sewing projects? I love this thing! Not having to lug out the ironing board for a little project like this is a really good thing!

Measure, Cut, and Quilt a Fabric Rectangle

This oven mitt is a total of 8-7/8 – inches long and 5-3/8 – inches wide when laid out flat.

I don't know about you, but it seems to me that quilting the fabric before cutting out the mitt is much easier.  When you cut the pieces first, it's more difficult to keep the edges in place as you sew the quilting.  Cutting the quilted piece altogether is easy.

Use scissors or a rotary cutter and a self-healing mat. So, first cut one of the fabrics into a rectangular shape 10-inches x 6-1/2 – inches. The extra fabric will give enough excess and you won’t have to fight keeping the edges together perfectly.

Cut the coordinating fabric for the lining 10-inches x 6-1/2- inches, also. Then, cut two pieces of cotton batting and one piece of Insul-Bright batting the same size.

Assembling the Layers

Use Basting Adhesive

Add Insul-Bright layer.

Lay the 2nd batting on the Insul-bright

Use basting spray to add the lining fabric

First, lay the lining fabric face down. If you’re using the basting spray, spray the fabric. Then, lay one layer of the cotton batting on top of the lining fabric. Lay the Insul-Bright batting on top of the cotton batting

Then, use the basting spray again and lay the second batting piece on top of the Insul-Bright batting. Spray the basting spray on the remaining cotton fabric piece and position on top of the cotton batting. Use the iron to press all the layers together.

For this project, we are just doing straight line quilting. A walking foot will also help prevent shifting of the multiple layers of fabric and batting. It’s not absolutely necessary to use a walking foot for this, but it does make it easier.

Use a Disappearing Ink Marker or Pencil, or Painter’s Tape

I struggled to see the marks from the disappearing ink pen on these darker fabrics. With all the layers together, it was hard to use the disappearing pencil. Then, I recalled seeing that a quilter uses painter’s tape. Wow! This works great!

As I recall, the quilter sews a quarter inch from the edge, but I wanted this to be easy. I just used the tape as the width between lines of stitching. You can see in the picture that the left edge of the front foot opening is lined up right along the painter’s tape when I straight stitch. (I use green FrogTape for painting, but regular blue painter’s tape will work just fine.)

Quilt the Sandwiched Fabrics

Lay a straight edge from one corner to the opposite corner. Then, lay the tape along the edge of the straight edge. Stitch along both edges of the tape. Then, lift the tape and lay it alongside one of the rows of stitching. Stitch along the outer edge.

The tape can be used a few times before losing its stickiness. Repeat this process until you have one side finished. Turn the fabric rectangle around and repeat on the other side.

Use a straight edge to lay the tape across the sandwiched fabric

Lay the tape along the straight edge.

Remove the tape and line it up along the stitched line.

Completely quilt the whole piece

Use the Template to Cut the Body of the Oven Mitt

Cut the template out of cardstock and place on the quilted rectangle. You can use a disappearing ink marker to trace around the template. Again, I couldn’t see the marker, so, I just used a Sharpie.

Use fabric scissors to cut around the tracing. Isn’t that a lot easier than trying to keep the sandwiched layers perfectly together as you sew?

Lay the template on the quilted fabric rectangle

Cut out the body of the oven mitt.

Make the Mini Oven Mitts Pockets

The inspiration piece has bias tape along the top edge of the pockets.  This just seemed like more bulk to have to wrap the bias tape around and, then having to sew through two more layers, too.  Instead, I've chosen to use a different technique.

First cut one of the fabrics into a rectangular shape 9-1/2 – inches x 6-1/2 – inches.

Cut the coordinating fabric for the lining 9 – 1/2 inches x 6-1/2 – inches.

Then, cut the two rectangles in half lengthwise. You’ll have two pieces from each of the fabrics 4-3/4 – inches x 6 – 1/2 – inches.

Next, cut two pieces of cotton batting 4-3/4 – inches x 6 -1/2 – inches.

Pocket pieces

Use Basting Adhesive

Use the basting spray on the fabric

Place the lining fabric face down on main fabric

Take the pocket fabric piece and lay it right side down. Place one of the cotton batting pieces on top. Flip the piece over, fabric side upward. Lay the lining fabric face down on top. Stitch 1/4 – inch along the top edge.

Open the seams and press with an iron. Then, spray some basting adhesive over the loose backside of the fabric and the batting. Fold back on the seam lines and press the pockets.

Stitch across the top straight edge 1/4-inch from the edge. Repeat for the second pocket.

Press the pocket rectangle

Stitch 1/4 – inch from the fold.

Then, center the template along the top edge of the pocket piece and trace around it with an invisible pen or Sharpie. Quilt the piece. The tape method works really well. For the pockets, I laid the tape parallel with the edges as you can see in the picture.

Trace around the pocket template

Use the masking tape and quilt the pocket

When you stitch the vertical lines, only stitch to the 1/4″ stitched line at the top of the piece. Then, reverse stitch before removing and cutting. See the picture below.

Assemble the Oven Mitt

If you haven’t used this spray adhesive, you need to try it. I love it! It makes keeping the pieces in place while sewing so much easier! Not wanting to spray the entire pocket, cut out a piece of paper to cover the center of the pocket. Then, spray a little bit of the adhesive along the edge. Repeat for the second pocket. Position on the quilted body piece. Make sure your edges are equidistant.

Change out your walking foot feed to your regular foot feed.

Baste or zigzag stitch around the outer edge to keep all of the layers together. This will make it easier to sew the binding to the oven mitt.

Bias Binding for the Mini Oven Mitts

The other day, I came across Jenny Doan ‘s You Tube video for a quilt Binding Technique which I had never seen before. I decided to try it on this oven mitt. Have you seen this technique?

Just cut a 2-1/4 – inch fabric strip on the bias. This strip is 27 – inches long and was plenty for this project. Instead of making the double-fold bias tape or buying it, with this method, you fold the strip in half and iron it.

Stitch bias strip to the mitt boday. — Stitch bias strip to the mitt.

Then, leaving a tail, lay the raw edges of the bias strip around the outer raw edges of the body, not the side with the pockets. Leave 4-inches unstitched where the two ends will overlap so you have room to sew the ends together. I didn’t leave that much room and ended up having to remove some of the stitches to be able to manipulate and sew the ends together.

Sewing the Ends Together

Where the binding ends overlap, cut the bottom binding straight across where you want it to overlap. Since our seam binding is 2-1/4 – inches wide, we want to overlap the seam binding 2-1/4 – inches. Cut the binding straight across at 2-1/4 – inches. See the picture below.

So, now you will sew the ends together just as if you were making bias seam binding. You make a plus sign crossing the ends of the binding. Right sides together, the right side of the top binding should overlap the end of the bottom binding. This is a little tricky and the clips are helpful to hold the fabrics together.

Right sides together, cross the ends.

Stitch from one corner

to the other corner.

Sew from corner to corner. See the pictures above. Double check and make sure you’ve measured perfectly. Wrap the bias around to the front and make sure it lays flat. Then, cut the triangular excess off a quarter inch from the seam.

Cut 1/4 – inch from seam

Perfect piecing together.

Iron the seam flat, fold the binding, and sew those last 4-inches in place. Then, pull the bias up and over the edge. I pinned the binding in place before topstitching. This method works nicely and there’s no obvious end. How cool is that?

Another option is to sew the binding to the front and then, blind stitch the backside by hand.