Wednesday, January 22, 2020

Blue Moon {Winter Blues Blog Hop}

Today I am participating in the Winter Blues blog hop hosted by Carla at Creatin' in the Sticks...


...and I am sharing a scrappy project for my Island Batik Ambassador project for January!

As an Island Batik Ambassador, I am provided with samples of various lines of Island Batik fabrics, Aurifil thread, Accuquilt products, and Hobbs Batting to use and share with you!


For my project, I decided to play with the scraps I had left over from the Starburst wall hanging I made for my August Island Batik Ambassador project. I had a quite a few of the 2.5" strips left over from the Sand Bar strip set and focused on using these for my project.


For a while, I have needed to make a new set of placemats -- one set that had six placemats instead of my usual four. Four is usually an easy number to make because you can use a single yard of fabric to back all four placemats and usually I don't need more than four. However, now that we are living in a house instead of an apartment (and I very much enjoy being the hostess with the mostest) I need at least one set of 6 placemats.

I used a modified version of the "jelly roll race" technique to make the base of my placemats. All together, I used about 20 strips. To begin, I sewed all but two of my 2.5" strips together on the diagonal (like you'd join binding strips) and pressed those seams open. I sewed my strip set in half three times so that my strip set was eight fabric strips wide and about 80"-85" long and then added one more 2.5" fabric strip so that my strip set was nine fabric strips wide. From there, I subcut my strip set in to six rectangles, 18.5" wide and 12.5" long.


Some of my subcut rectangles have more color changes than others, but this was much faster than trying to piece each one individually!

Next, I quilted each placemat -- I used two different fabrics for the backings, the navy/teal feather batik and the light blue cheerio print. I used the same teal variegated Aurifil thread as the top thread for all six placemats, however, I used a bunch of different colors in my bobbins to use up bobbin scraps! I used navy, emerald green, light teal, and even a bit of purple!


These pictures show the placemats before trimming -- I roughly cut the backing and the batting for each placemat before I quilted it. And in the effort of using scraps, I also used scraps of Hobbs batting left over from previous Ambassador projects in these placemats. I had some larger scraps that I used for four of them and then pieced scrap battings for the final two placemats.


Since I know these will be going through the washing machine and used repeatedly, I'm not too concerned about the backings not all being the same -- and the same for the binding! I used three different fabrics for the bindings. For placemats, I always sew my bindings completely by machine.


Now my table is ready for my next dinner party!


Make sure to check out all of the other bloggers hopping today and check out the full schedule on Carla's blog!

Wednesday, January 22nd


Thank you for visiting Little Bunny Quilts and please follow me in whatever way you prefer!

32 comments:

  1. So pretty. It is a wonderful use of scraps, and useful too.

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  2. What a beautiful way to use those strips! Your table will be so lovely with them. Thanks for sharing!

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  3. Hi Alison! These are amazing, and what I like best about them is that they all look different. From the exact same fabrics yet they are each unique. This will look so pretty on your table, and the bindings finish them off well. I would fight over sitting by the more teal one . . . HAHA! ~smile~ Roseanne

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  4. Nice use of scraps, thanks for the inspiration. I need to make some!

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  5. Cute placemats, and great use for all those scraps.

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  6. The jelly roll race technique is a great idea to use up scraps and strips. Your placemats look great. Nice way to use up batting scraps.

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  7. Perfect use of scraps and a great set of placemats to boot!

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  8. Beautiful blues, and great idea for placemats!

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  9. Those are so pretty! Great use for leftover strips!

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  10. Such a great idea for the leftovers. Thanks for sharing the inspiration and how you did it.

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  11. What a great way to dress up your table, Alison! Smart choice for you Hop project.

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  12. I love your placemats. What a great way to use up scraps.

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  13. Pretty and practical....got to be happy with that. Funny I also used batik fabrics for my table runner. I sense a theme happening here!

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  14. Very clever, very quick! Thanks for the idea.

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  15. Your placemats are beautiful! Great job!

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  16. Your table is going to look fabulous with the new placemats. Loved that you used from your scrap basket.

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  17. Placemats are a perfect way to use up those scraps and they are so pretty with those Island Batik fabrics. Such a great and practical way to use those blues. Thanks for joining the Winter Blues Blog Hop.

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  18. Great looking placemats! I love the different blues you used!

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  19. What a great way to use those beautiful strips and create 6 unique place mats!! I just might need to do something like this, but I'll leave them in one piece for the quilting on my longarm and then cut them apart!! I love fast projects!!

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  20. What a great way to make a set of fun place mats! I think the different bindings add a lot of charm, and what a great way to use up some fabric.

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  21. Sweet! It's a great idea for placemats.

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  22. Such pretty fabrics! Your place mats are great.

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  23. Those placemats showcase the fabrics beautifully - well done!

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  24. Such a fun project... love the play on the strips

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  25. Beautiful! And I love that you use scraps for the back and the bobbin scraps, too! Good idea to make one big rectangle and cut into smaller pieces for each place mat.

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