Go Green with your own Straw Holder
My husband and I went on a little vacation to Seattle, Washington. We had a fantastic time! While we were there, we did all the recommended touristy things and of course, Pike Place Market was on the list!
While we were at Pike Place Market, we came across a cute booth that sold handmade glass straws. We ended up purchasing several straws. The name of the company is DrinkingStraws.glass. They are a family business established in 2011. It is a husband-and-wife team. The husband hand makes each straw himself. They have a variety of drinking straws from lengths, diameters, and designs.
What we like about their drinking straws is that their products are reusable, eco-friendly, extremely durable, and dishwasher/microwave safe. Also included with your purchase is a reusable cleaning brush. This company also backs up their straws with a Lifetime Guaranty!
We loved that we can help out the environment and support small business with our purchase. My mother-in-law got the cute turtle one. My husband and I opted for their classic original straws, 9.55 mm diameter, 8 inches length, in pink and blue. Check out their website here to shop.
DrinkingStraws.glass also sells their own straw holder accessories for traveling and keeping straws safe, however, I felt that I could DIY some straw holders myself with some of the fabric I designed as soon as I got home from our trip. Here is my tutorial on how I made my straw holders.
Things you’ll need for this project:
- Fabric for outer layer (21 inch by 2.5 inch)
- Fabric for the inner (21 inch by 2.5 inch)
- Velcro
- Scissors
- Interfacing ( cut 1 piece 20 inch by 2 inch)
- Iron
- Chop stick or something pointy
The fabric measurement above is for the 8-inch straw length. If you have a 10-inch straw length, cut out 23 inches by 2.5 inch.
For this project, I used some special fabrics. For the outer fabric, I used the teal polka dots fabric design that is a part of the Blue Rose Garden fabric collection I designed, available on Spoonflower. You can find the whole collection here.
I purchased the Spoonflower Petal Signature cotton which is 100% cotton. I like the way this fabric feels. It is their most popular fabric out of 26 different options.
For the inner fabric, I used an antimicrobial fabric from a website called Wazoodle. I chose the color grey (to hide stains) and ordered 1 yard. This fabric is eco- friendly, water proof, hypo allergenic, BPA free, and made in the USA.
I found that the waterproof side can be a bit difficult to sew if you sew 2 pieces of the antimicrobial fabrics. However, if you sew only one of the grey antimicrobial pieces, with one of the Spoonflower Petal Signature cotton pieces, the project turns out great.
I love that the inner liner is antimicrobial and waterproof, perfect for straws. You can always toss this straw holder in the wash as well.
Once all your pieces are cut, sew the interfacing onto the outer fabric backside. I used my iron to fuse these pieces together. I placed the interfacing right in the center to avoid bulking in the corners and sides.
I do not recommend adding interfacing to both the inner and outer pieces of fabric as that will make the holder too bulky to flip inside out.
To sew the pieces together, face fabrics right sides together. Use a 3/8 inch seam allowance.
See photo on left. Don’t forget to leave a space of about 3 inches to turn the holder inside out.
Trim all 4 corners, careful not to cut into the stitching line.
Turn the straw holder inside out. You can use a chop stick or something pointy to help you with this part. Take your time as you do this step.
Once you turn the holder inside out, you can top stitch the opening close. Do not worry about this, as you will cover the top stitch when you sew the final top stitch of the holder.
Time to add the velcro! Cut the velcro to 1 inch by 3/4 inch.
Top stitch the velcro to the holder as shown in the photo.
The last step is to add the top stitch to the straw holder. Don’t forget to back stitch at the beginning and ending.
For the body of the holder, the measurements can vary as there are different straw size lengths. The straw length that I purchased is 8.5 inch so the made the body of my straw to about 9 inches. With the top folded down, the final measurement of my straw holder is 2 inches by 9 inches.
I hope you enjoyed this project. Let’s all do our part and go Green! Yay!
With Love and Aloha,
Kris Wong
