Autumn Coffee Cup Cozies

Is it just me, or did pumpkin spice season start waaay too early this year? Maybe it’s just the fact that we’ve had 90 degree days in October that’s throwing me off. In any event, autumn decor and pumpkin spice are everywhere, so I decided to join in with a little gift for some coffee loving friends.

These little coffee cozies are quick and easy to make. I picked up some fun buttons at my local fabric shop for decoration, used my Silhouette machine and some iron-on vinyl for the lettering, and the rest is just scrap linen left over from my recent patchwork pillows plus a little low loft batting.

If you’re starting from scratch, you’ll need:

A fat quarter of fabric or a scrap piece at least 11″ x 11″
A scrap of low loft batting about 4″ x 10″
A large button with a shank back or one small and one large flat button
A short piece of narrow elastic

To make them, first download the pattern here and print it out at 100%.

Use the outer line of the pattern as a guide to cut two cozies from fabric.

Use the inner line of the pattern to cut one cozie from batting. Set one of the fabric pieces aside for now, lay the other fabric piece wrong side up, and layer the batting on top. You want to position the batting about 1/4″ from one straight edge. You’ll have a little more than 1/4″ of fabric extending beyond the batting on the other straight edge.

Hand baste the batting to the fabric with a loose running stitch.

Wrap the elastic around your button to determine how long you want the elastic loop to be. Mark the ends of the loop with a pencil and trim the elastic so it’s about 1/2″ longer than the mark on either end. (Here’s where I cheated a bit. I didn’t want to use just a shank button because I wanted to give the elastic something more substantial to wrap around. I used a small button for the base, cut the wimpy little shanks off my decorative buttons and glued them on top of the small buttons. See the last few steps of the tutorial for more details.)

Lay the remaining fabric cozy piece on your work surface right side up. Measure over 1/4″ from the straight edge and draw a guide line in the center of the fabric. Lay your elastic on top, folded in half and with the loop toward the center. Line up the marks you made on the elastic with the line you just drew on the fabric and temporarily clip or pin the elastic in place.

Lay the other piece of fabric on top, batting up, so the right sides of the fabrics are facing with the elastic sandwiched in between. The elastic should be on one end of the cozy, and the longer fabric edge should be on the other.

Starting at the non-elastic edge, sew up one curved side, across the end with the elastic (backstitch a few times over the elastic), and down the other curved side. Leave the remaining straight edge open for turning. You want to sew through the fabric only, as close to the batting as possible, but DON’T sew the batting.

Trim away the excess fabric on the curved sides.

Turn the cozy right side out and press.

Fold the raw ends in and hand stitch closed.

Pull out the basting stitches. At this point, you can either add a row of decorative stitching to the top and bottom of the cozies like I did, or just top stitch or trim with narrow rickrack.

You can download the jpg files for the wording here:

Cut out the lettering in the iron-on vinyl of your choice. Weed the iron-on and center it on the cozy. Iron in place following the manufacturer’s instructions

Fold the cozy as if your were wrapping it around the cup and mark the placement for your button. Sew the button in place. (If you’re using the big button/small button combo like I did, sew your small button on first, then hot glue the large button on top.) Add any other embellishment you’d like. I had a little apple core button in my stash that was perfect for the “happy fall, y’all!” cozy.