Recovering Your Ironing Board

I don't know about you, but I am definitely one of those "out of sight, out of mind" kind of people.  I just don't think about ironing unless the ironing board is handy.  The more I sew, too, the more I realize that ironing is a must for good results.  Realizing this a few years ago, I brought the ironing board out of the cupboard, dusted it off, and put it out.  I quickly realized that the fabric they used to make the original cover was, in my opinion, a) hideous and b) hideous in my room.   Fortunately, I saw this tutorial for recovering an ironing board and had the fabulous results I shared here.  It has been three years since I recovered both my big ironing board and my desktop ironing board and with the "mango madness" orange transformed to "celery sprig" green, the fabrics I loved so much then do not make me smile now.  Still, I'm using my ironing boards a lot, so they need to stay out.  Finally, as my beloved Superman commented, they stand out like a sore thumb in the serenity of my "new" space. 



Orange really isn't the look I was going for here...

 Clearly, a change was needed.  I headed out to Hancock Fabric and found a fabric that would make me smile.  (Yeah, the smiling thing...if I have to look at something all the time, I want to like looking at it.)  Now, I could have done like before and reused the casing the the strings from the original board covers.  (See it here?  You can see the blue and white on the edge...)

The blue and white fabric, the blue plastic thingy, and the white string
are remnants of the original ironing board cover.  Buh-bye!

 Instead, I got brave and decided to begin fresh this time.  It really isn't a big deal...I did both ironing boards in one evening.  I thought I'd share with you just how easy it is to recover your ironing board.

See the chalk outline?  It is just that simple to get the right size.

First, flip your ironing board on its back and trace the shape of the board onto your new fabric.  Add approximately three inches all around to all for the new casing and the wrap around the board.

See?  I just traced with fabric chalk and cut it out.  Truly, I just eye-balled the
entire thing.

Cut out your fabric.

I didn't even double over the casing...just a down and dirty hem. 
It is going to be on the underside and the inside of your ironing board.
Just remember to leave an opening to thread your elastic through.

 Fold over one inch and iron for the casing.

See the elastic?  I tied it in a knot and trimmed it close AFTER I took this picture.

Sew the casing, leaving an opening to thread elastic through the entire thing.  Making sure you keep both ends of the elastic from slipping into the casing, try your ironing board cover on for size.  Fiddle with it until you get it just right and tie it off when you have it taut.  That's it...you're done!


There you have it.  A new ironing board cover...pretty simple, right?  I've used them both since I recovered them and they do make me smile.  Mission accomplished!

I love how these turned out...

I think it is quite ironic that a girl who really doesn't like to iron spent time making her ironing boards "pretty". I know it sounds odd, but I like to be surrounded by things that make me smile and seriously, the "plain wrap blue" and the "cream with blue stripes" didn't match my orange walls. Since my family room/schoolroom/craft room is all the same room, the ironing boards are always visible. We have no cupboards in which to hide them. So, I've been tucking the big one next to my shelves and I had the little blue one (great for small sewing projects!) on the back of the door. As we've made more and more progress on the room, however, I just couldn't leave them the way they were. (They were sad, seriously sad.) So, I recovered them using a tutorial I found at U-handblog. Quite some time ago Lisa gave step-by-step instructions to do a quick and easy re-do of your ironing board cover and I held on to it until I had the right fabrics. When I say easy, I mean "EASY". I did both ironing boards in about an a hour and a half. Even if your ironing board does have a happy little cupboard that it hides away in, maybe you'd pull it out a little more often if it was covered in fabric you just adored. (Okay, probably not, but still, it would be nice to be looking at something you liked while you were ironing, right?)


Now that I love the fabric on the big board, we'll be using some hooks and hanging on the wall like a piece of art...I got the hooks today, but because the ironing board is pretty substantial, Superman is going to mount them on a piece of wood and mount the wood onto the wall with super powerful screws (or whatever it takes so I don't accidentally rip a huge hole in the wall). I'm just so glad I saved this tutorial and took the time to recover these ironing boards. They really are fun now.