How To Fill A Rice Bag Out Of This Funny Empty Bag Thingy That Your So-Called Friend Sent You

(This is a for those insanely lucky people who received a rice bag described here!)

Here is what your rice-bag-to-be might look like: most of it is closed, but there is an opening at one end.

Pour some rice into a large cup.

Take a fancy stainless steel professional-grade funnel - or roll up a piece of paper as I did - and place the narrow end in your bag opening. This might be surprisingly tricky to juggle in one hand; luckily, you are gifted and talented and will figure it out.

Pour your rice through the funnel, and into the bag. We found this easier when the bag was sitting right on the table top.

Your bag will now look a little more than half-full, like this:

 Now pin your bag to keep the rice out of the way...

... and sew along those neat little pencil lines to close the bag.

You can use a needle-and-thread, or a sewing machine. If you are hand-stitching, I recommend 2 lines of straight stitch, 1 line in one direction and then just sew right back over it to where you began. Start and finish with secure knots so the thread doesn't quit and go on vacation.

If you want to achieve sew-y neatness, you can pull the knot between the layers (see below) and then trim the end so that it doesn't show. If your knots are big and bad and on display for the whole wide world to see, that works too. The Knot Police are very cool with this.

 Making a knot, burying the end between the layers...

... remove the pins, and ta-dah! A rice bag!

And you can slip it neatly into your rice bag cover for utter rice bag gorgeousness!! Woo-hoo!!

Heat this in your microwave for 1 minute, toss it around, and repeat for 30 second increments. It will be good and hot by about 3 minutes.

Alternatively, store it in the freezer, and use as an ice pack. It is truly all good.