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Many of the mending skills and projects I share are common ones that lots of people have to deal with, but mending holes in a tea towel is probably not one of those.
Still, when I was folding laundry the other day and noticed this flour sack style towel had a few holes (not to mention a stain), it seemed like just the time to mend a tea towel and show you what I did to make it super cute.
Materials
At its most basic for this project you’ll need a towel with holes in in and a needle and thread, plus thread cutting scissors.
Because there were so many holes close to each other on this towel and some of them were pretty big, instead of just mending holes in a tea towel I actually wanted to cover them up. You can use plain muslin for this (which I did on the back) or if you happen to have a cute bit of embroidery on muslin lying around you can use that, too.
And then I decided I might as well use my sewing machine for the bigger patch, which also required an iron and a handful of straight pins. But you can absolutely do this all by hand, it will just take longer and I was feeling impatient.
Mending Holes in a Tea Towel
I stared with a little hole and decided to mend it by doing a little weaving over the hole.
Begin with a threaded needle and coordinating (or contrasting if that’s more your style) thread. Tie a knot an bring the needle through the fabric from the back to the front.
Take some long stitches across the width of the hole.
Then bring the needle back up next to the end of these stitches and weave over and under through the stitches you just made.
Make a little stitch on the other side to hold the thread down and continue back to the top of the hole.
This doesn’t have to be perfect and you can also weave in and out of the fabric where there is some to make this more stable.
Finish off with a knot on the back of the towel and trim any excess thread.
There was also a hole that looked more like a cut, and I just mended this one by stitching across the hole to close the fabric back up.
Patching Holes in a Tea Towel
Mending holes in a tea towel is great if the holes are small, but there were a few holes here that were bigger than I wanted to deal with.
And once I remembered I had that piece of muslin with a whisk, spoon and spatula on it, I knew I needed to use that in the project.
I started by trimming it down closer to the size I needed to cover the holes.
I cut a strip of the muslin I cut off to cover the holes from the back side.
I sewed this piece on using the zig zag setting on my sewing machine, but you can also sew it by hand. Either pink or fold over the edges if you want it to look a little nicer and avoid fraying in the wash.
For the big patch I folded over the edges and ironed them down.
Then I pinned the patch in place and sewed with a straight stitch close to the edge all the way around.
If you’re stitching by hand you can do the same thing, or this might be a fun time to throw in some contrasting thread and a blanket stitch edging for extra cuteness.
Mending holes in a tea towel is an easy way to get more life out of them and make them cuter in the process. Sure, you could just fix the holes and be on your way, but why not add some whimsy while you’re at it?
