My Latest Project

It's fair to say I've been a little stir crazy.  I am finally in a place where I can sit up right for a few hours and not hurt and so I found myself at my sewing machine the last couple of days.  Melanie and I have been talking about how everyone seems to have their own version of table setting.  To take the confusion out of everything for the teachers and the children I made a placemat that clearly shows how to do a proper place setting.We will have two of these, one for each campus that will go into a basket with all the other elements for setting a table.  The children will each get a  presentation of this new material and so they and the teachers will know exactly how to lay the table for a meal.  While I was sewing I was thinking how the simple art of setting a table and knowing the proper placement of each element is a lost art.  There should be great care in how we do this and how the children learn this is important.  We want our children to contribute at meal times and they want to be apart of what we do.  In our home we eat by candle light each night with real cloth napkins and linens or placemats.  Each of our children work together to set the table for dinner nightly.  After the meal they help load the dishwasher and clear the table and clean up.  It's our time to wind down
from the day and hear about everyone's day.

 Here is how I made the placemat.  I took a small placemat I already had and added a few more inches .  My placemat measures 12 inches by 18 inches.  I used two fabrics (one for front and back).  I sewed the two good sides together and then turned it right sided out.

I have a cutting mat, measuring guide and rotary cutter.  It makes cutting super easy and exact.  

 This is how the place mat should look after you have it sewed together and turned right sides out.  You will need to press all of your sewing as you go with a hot iron.

 Next, I used our actual dishwater to trace out the templates for each element of the place setting.I was able to free hand the fork, knife and spoon.

 After I traced the parts out I ironed the fabric to Heat and Bond.  This is a great product for sticking to other fabrics.

After you iron the Heat and Bond to your fabric you then cut out the pieces you traced.  Peel the paper off your fabric and with the glue side down place your pieces onto your placemat. 

This is the final product.  Once I had everything ironed in place I did a zigzag stitch around each piece to secure it.  These will see a lot of laundering and so it needs to hold up.  Now I just need to make 30 for Cork Street and 14 for Quinpool!  I will let you know how  that goes!