Ice Cube Zipper Pouch

Hello sweet people trying to stay cool during this hot summer. I have a cool project to share with you. I made a bag to store ice cubes in the freezer. Now you might wonder why I would need such a bag? Well let me tell you. For years we had no freezer at all. We have a small refrigerator, but it has no freezer. We didn't think we would really need a freezer as it would only encourage us to buy frozen desserts! LOL!! 

A couple of years ago we thought it might be nice to have a freezer and we got a chest style freezer on sale that was the right size to place in our kitchen. So we got it. It has one long basket inside, but no shelves. Making ice was a challenge as where could we put the ice cubes trays? The basket was full of food and I would place ice cube trays on top of frozen bags until they were frozen enough to empty into a Ziplock plastic bag where I stored them. 

I happened upon a couple of silicone ice cube trays at a thrift shop that had a metal rim around them and got them. They were shorter trays, but fit perfectly straddling the basket in the freezer. Plus I love how easily the ice pops out of the tray by pushing on the back side. The ice is more of a tube shape than a cube, but they are great for adding to water bottles. 

The plastic Ziplock bag was getting heavy with use and it was hard to get the ice into the plastic bag when it is empty as the bags are flat without any bottom to stand up. I thought I should make a zipper pouch that has a bottom and roomy inside and that can stand on it's own to make it easier to add the ice into the bag. So I searched online to find food safe fabric to use for the lining of the bag. I bought a yard of it (choose the one on sale) in a pretty pale yellow fabric. I had not idea what type of food safe fabric to buy as there were many to choose from. The one I got was thin and rather slippery to work with. It was 2mil and I wasn't sure what mil would be best? 

While I was waiting for the lining fabric to arrive, I choose the fabric and the pattern I decided on using. Looking through my batik fabric, I found I had this snowflake print, which I thought was a perfect choice. I paired it with a yellow batik print. I quilted the blue fabric to fleece in a triangle mountain peak sort of design I drew. Hard to see it in the photos though. I knew I wanted to appliqué the words "Ice Cubes" on the front of the bag, so I did that first. I chose to use the Scooter Pouch by AllSewPetite, but I eliminated all the straps and hardware and the zipper pocket. I also added a tab at each end of the zipper to grab on to when zipping and unzipping the bag as well as a grab handle at one end. It turned out great! And it's so useful too. If we had shelves in our freezer, then we could have just used a plastic bin to store ice cubes in, but this is at great solution for us and it's so much prettier, don't you think? You could also use the Isabella Pouch as well, since it is the same basic shape as the Scooter Pouch. Since I had tested the Scooter Pouch for Monika, I used it. Both bag patterns have a free video tutorial. Check out Monika's YouTube channel here for all her patterns (she does a video for her all her patterns, whether they are free or you pay for the pdf with templates). Her instructions are always great! So whether you want to follow the pdf or the video or both, you can do it either way.

The snowflake batik was a great choice for this pouch, along with the "Ice Cubes" appliqué.

Top view.

The pretty yellow food safe lining fabric in yellow.

The other side. I quilted the blue fabric in a triangle mountain peak sort of design I drew. Hard to see the quilting in these photos.

Full of ice cubes. Or they look more like ice tubes, lol!!! That makes me cooler just looking at that bag full of ice!

Stay cool my friends!
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