Feb 1

Feb 1 Grey, Blue, and Red (GBR) Placemats

When all of my friends were getting married left and right, I made a plan to put together extra placemats, coasters, and potholders. These are things I like to give as gifts. But I also like to make them to match the wedding colors. This makes planning ahead a little difficult, but I like a good challenge.

My mom suggested I make some placemats with this color scheme—grey, blue, and red. She needed some for a wedding gift of her own. She thought they would look good, and my mother being the artist that she is was completely right. These colors are beautiful together. I had to make this set in the same colors.

For these placemats I only used fat quarters (FQ).

4 FQs of fabric A (red)
1 FQ of fabric B (grey 1)
1 FQ of fabric C (grey 2)
1 FQ of fabric D (blue 1)
1 FQ of fabric E (blue 2)

This is not the most cost effective way to make these. But if you have a build up of fat quarters like I do, they are a good way to bust a stash. I usually buy fat quarters in pairs, so you could spread fabric A out and use two of each of the others. Fabric A is primarily used for the backing, and you can spread that love to all of the other materials as well. In fact, that’s what I usually do.

I cut 2-inch strips off the long side of the fat quarters (4 of fabric A and 2 from each of the others with a total of 12). And then I sewed those strips together with a ¼ inch seam.

From this new piece of fabric I cut off 3-inch strips. I got 6 strips out of it. Then came the decision of how to use those strips. I could have repeated the process and made more strips. I didn’t want to have extra strips though, either. So I problem solved. Here’s what I came up with:

I didn’t write down the measurements for the wide pieces of fabric, which was silly. Basically you want the placemats to be 13 inches tall and 17 inches wide, or close to that.

When you cut the backing, make sure that you add an inch to each side (so 15in x 19in).

For the quilting I did a zig-zag stitch along the seams in black thread. Quilt through the top layer, the batting, and the backing.

I did the binding my favorite way—by folding it and wrapping it around the edge of the project. The tutorial I used is here. Check it out. She explains it really well.