Recycled Hand Warmer

I've made this sort of hand warmer for myself out of large socks, but I got the idea for this one watching my daughter wait for the school bus this past winter. She looked very cute all bundled up, but her hands get chilled and often she wears a pair of gloves and a pair of mittens. I wanted to make her a pocket sized warmer and use some out grown socks at the same time.

We used out grown toddler socks, a marker, some broken bottom of the rice container grains (I've heard of using ceramic pie weights but I was worried it would get too hot), if you can sew you might want a needle and thread, too.

Start by filling one sock until you have a good little sausage shape. It helps to leave a little empty room, so you can fold a small flap, to hold the rice in for the next step.

Take your full and folded sock and insert it into the empty sock.

If you can sew, put a few stitches around the edge of what was the empty sock to secure it to the full sock. If your socks are stretchy and full enough they hold together under normal use. Don't juggle them or play hackey sack with it unless you sew it up first.

Decorate as you like keeping in mind it needs to be microwave safe. No metal findings or easily combustible paint. We used sharpie and highlighter.

I found my microwave took 30 seconds (take it out squeeze and flip it around to distribute heat) and another 30 seconds to warm the thing to a safe temperature (i.e. not too hot). I wrote it on the thing so we wouldn't forget.

There you have it, thanks for looking.