A Fresh New Ironing Board Cover

 Hello Readers. If you ever iron than you know how easy it is to scorch or burn your ironing board cover. Those irons get hot. It can happen to everyone but it looks pretty awful and dirty after a while. At least that was the case for me. I like to sew and that means I iron often. And that means I have burned the life out of my ironing board cover.

New ironing board, who dis?

Here is my old ironing board and my burned out cover. It looks dirty and I don't like that. I was taking this whole ironing board out of my sewing room because I got a new one.  

Look at this burned out mess I made! 

I got a new-old ironing board actually. This is actually made of wood and is vintage for sure. I don't have a makers mark but I love the way the wood looks. It is very solid and really pretty. Too pretty for that old yucky cover that I burned up. 

So here I am putting that rotten cover back on the wooden ironing board, why did I do that?? Well, I needed that padding in the cover. The padding is not just normal cushion material it is heat resistant. I am going to want that on my ironing board for sure. If I use regular batting I might regret it because it won't be able to handle the heat of a long hot ironing sessions. 

I had some pre-washed pink cotton fabric that I wanted to hide my ironing board cover. (I used pre-washed fabric so it won't bleed dye on things when I iron. Do not use polyester or synthetic fabric. It won't be able to handle the heat of ironing.) I am going to have this on top so the burn marks are hidden but the padding I need is still on the ironing board. I spread the fabric over the ironing board so that the edges of the pink fabric hung off the sides by at least 3 inches. I cut the excess off the fabric. I needed 2 inches of hanging fabric all around the ironing board. 

 

I used my sharp sewing scissors to cut all around the ironing board. It doesn't have to be cut perfectly. The edges won't show when we are done. I cut off anything more than the 2 inches hanging off the edge. You will end up with a piece of fabric that is ironing board shaped and a bit larger than your ironing board. 

 

I used elastic to finish the cover. I sewed the elastic to the edge of the fabric around all sides. The elastic will pull the edges in and gather the fabric. This is why your fabric and cutting didn't need to be perfect earlier. The edges will be gathered together with the elastic and it will hide all the imperfections. I used my serger for this step. You could also use a zigzag stitch to keep the edges from fraying and attach the elastic all in one step. Remember to pull or stretch the elastic a little as you sew. That will gather the fabric together. 

 

The elastic will shrink up and your new fabric cover might seem small but it will stretch around the ironing board and stay put when you put it on. The elastic will tighten up under the ironing board and keep everything in place. 

 

I have used this cover several times already and it is nice to have a fresh clean ironing board to use. The pink matches my sewing room really well but you can use any fabric or color you like. Thanks for reading along, now go make something fun for yourself.