Wednesday Sewing - Quilted Valentine's Day Table Mat

We finally got all our Christmas decorations put away!  I don't do a lot of decorating for Valentine's Day, but I do like to have some type of mat on the dining room table, so I decided to try a quilted one.  This actually turned out to be pretty quick and easy.

Materials:
*1 1/2 yards material for top and bottom
*scraps or fat quarters in at least 5 different colors/patterns
*2 1/2 yards bias tape
*fusible felt
*Steam-A-Seam
*patterns


1.  Print the patterns and cut them out.  To make the patterns actual size, I used newspaper.  For the top/bottom pattern, take a folded piece of newspaper.

Fold the top right corner down to the bottom left corner and crease.

Do this one more time.

Place the fold edge of the printed pattern along the solid fold of the newspaper.  Trace the top curve of the pattern and cut along that line.

Open up and it should look like this:

For the heart applique, place fold edge of the applique printed pattern along the folded edge of a piece of newspaper.  Trace and cut out.

2.  Cut your scraps/fat quarters into 2 inch strips.  I finally bought a rotary cutter and mat - this is definitely the way to go!  I just stacked them and cut them up.  If you don't have one, marking two inches with chalk marks is the easiest way I've found.

3.  Using 1/4 inch seams, sew together in five strip blocks, mixing up the order of your fabrics.  Press seams open.

4.  Even up the ends of your blocks and cut them into 2 inch strips. 

5.  Now sew these strips together in 5 strip blocks (1/4 inch seams again) and press the seams open.  Mix up the patterns so that every block looks different.  You'll only need 4 blocks, so you might want to save the other strips for another project.

6.  Trace four heart appliques onto the top side (so it will have the sticky on it still when the sheets are separated) of Steam-A-Seam.  Take the bottom sheet off and iron onto the wrong side of each block.

Cut out.

7.  Fold top/bottom fabric with cut edges meeting so you'll have a double layer big enough for the pattern.  Pin the pattern on and cut out.

8.  Remove the remaining paper piece from the appliques and position on the table mat top.  I just moved them around until they looked good.  Iron on.

9.  Sew along edges of appliques with a zigzag stitch.  On my Brother, I used a .2 length and 3.5 width.

10.  Using the top/bottom pattern, cut a piece of fusible felt.  Fuse to the top.  Pin top to bottom.

11.  Sew around the outside of the hearts and again on the inside of the zigzag stitches.  Free motion quilt (I just used a random pattern) on the portions of the top fabric that are showing.  See this post for a tutorial on free motion quilting.

Finish the edges with bias tape (see this post if needed) and you're done!

Happy Creating!  Deborah