Flattening the Curve, Day 23

Hello friends. It's the twenty-third day of my mandatory leave from my work site due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and today I learned how to sew a cloth face mask.

On April 3rd the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention here in the United States "recommends wearing cloth face coverings in public settings where other social distancing measures are difficult to maintain (e.g. grocery stores and pharmacies) especially in areas of significant community-based transmission."

Coincidentally, our household had a box of disposable face masks that I had purchased for my son last year during allergy season. Since we learned of the recommendation to wear a face mask in public, we've been using the remaining few disposable masks that were left in the box. Of course whenever we go out for groceries and supplies we've looked for more face masks but, like toilet paper, the store shelves are empty.

There have been many times in my life that I have been grateful that my mother taught me to sew when I was young, but never has it meant so much to me as during this pandemic. Because of her I have always had a sewing machine in the house and a basic supply of thread, scissors, pins, etc. So it was just a matter of finding a pattern and getting busy on the task.

I found an easy tutorial called How to Sew a Simple Fabric Face Mask on the Japanese Creations blog, gave it a try and am happy to report it really is simple.

The site provides a PDF template for printing out a pattern. There are three sizes to choose from - small, medium and large. I made the medium one today and it fits me quite well. I opted to add a nose wire as suggested in another Japanese Creations post called How to Keep Your Glasses From Fogging Up When Wearing a Mask. I wasn't concerned with glasses fogging - I just wanted the mask to fit more snugly. The article suggests using any kind of wire you have around the house. I used a twist tie from some electronic purchase in the past. It really works.

The mask tutorial suggested leaving an opening in the upper portion of the mask in order to insert some kind of filter. I did leave an opening for a filter but have not yet experimented with trying to insert a filter. I'm thinking I'll use a coffee filter as I have plenty of those in my pantry.

I still need to make at least three more cloth face masks, so I will try to share more later...

And as my mom would always say, goodbye for now.