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Tiny and I began working on these little beauties a couple of weeks ago. Originally, I bought the material for these so that the littles could make Christmas presents for our female relatives and well, life. But not one to waste a crafting opportunity, I got out the sewing machine and stitched up the base for some scented sachets. They turned out beautifully, and I can’t wait to see what the kids do with them next theme night!
You start with one yard of your fabric base. I chose a pale pink satin from my local fabric store, but any fabric that suits your taste will work. I selected satin because we are using them as gifts and I wanted a silky, luxurious look and feel to the finished product. What lady wouldn’t love to receive one of these gloriously scented little pillows of freshness to tuck into her lingerie drawer? I cut my fabric into 6 inch by 8 inch rectangles.
We are going to fold those in half, bringing one 6 inch side over to meet the other, forming the basic tube for the sachet. I didn’t iron them this time because I didn’t want a crease on the top of the finished sachet. You can pin them, but with this fabric and the small size, I didn’t feel the need to pin. Make sure right sides are together before you sew. Start with the long side, then completely finish one full short side using a quarter inch seam allowance.
The final short side should only be sewn half way – this is so you can turn your tube inside out through the opening. I like to take projects where I am making multiples in stages – cut all the fabric, sew all the tubes, mix the filling, then fill and finish each base, etc.
Mix your filling. For this project, I am using barley as the filling for the sachets. You can use cotton batting, polyfil, rice, barley, the options are endless depending on the result you want. I have found that the scent does linger longer with grains as the filling. I used one pound of pearled barley for every three sachets I wanted to fill. The barley is easy to find in the dried rice and grain section of your local grocery store. Mine carries it in one pound bags. Snip open the barley and transfer to a ziplock style bag that seals well. Add 30 drops of your essential oil of choice and stir with a spoon to really mix the oil through the barley. Seal and shake – shake some more – now let the kids have a shake (hence the seals well portion above). Your craft room is going t smell heavenly by this point! I chose jasmine for our scent. Fill the bags ¾ full of your barley mixture and sew closed.
The next step does take some patience. You can hand stitch the opening closed, but I used the machine. Fold your fabric into the opening to create a straight seam on the unfinished side of your sachet. Then, barely leaving any seam allowance, stitch the seam, from the top to the bottom of the open side – making sure you include the full length of the sachet is included to create fully finished edge. For the sake of symmetry, I also flipped the sachet over and added a matching seam to the other edge to create a beautiful little finished side there as well.
Once you have closed the sachet, the decoration options are endless! I had some spare ivory lace with gold flecks and buttons that we grabbed to test out the look. We simply cut our lace to the desired length and tied a double knot to secure the lace. Since the sachets are only ¾ full, the lace tied in the middle created the effect of beautiful, feminine little bows.
To finish, we sewed on a pearl button and done! Absolutely love all things rose gold, so the effect of the rose satin, ivory and gold lace and pearl button was perfect for my taste. This project is going to be a bit out of reach of Teeny, but Tiny and her friends are going to love decorating these sachets for our upcoming theme night before Valentine’s Day – meanwhile, my closet smells amazing!
I made a dozen sachets from the yard of fabric, but had some fabric left over, so I whipped up these little travel size gems. I will use them in my suitcase for my upcoming trip to Central America. Even the best organized suitcase gets a little funky after a week in the Central American sun. These travel size sachets will be perfect to tuck into shoe bags, as well as the compartments that contain my used clothing. Perfect!
Note that you can see the finished edges clearly in this photo. You could easily tuck some lace in before you finish them (include in the initial seam you make on the first side you sew) if you would rather have lace on the sides than in the middle. The options are only limited by your creativity.
