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Friday, August 31, 2012

Finished Octagonal Placemats

Oh my gosh! This has been a project for a long time! I shared the picture of my first time free motion quilting with my darning foot in this post My Second Quilt Plan back in March. So this has been at least since then! And looking at my pictures, it was put together in February! I had posted them on Craftsy.com then Craftsy - Octagon Placemats. I guess considering it has taken me over 6 (7?) years to finish a blanket I have been trying to crochet, 6 months isn't that long to finish a project!

 
The purpose of this project was for me to practice my free motion quilting so that way I could do Nikolai's quilt (that has taken a while to get to). I do not want to mess up royally on his blanket, so why not do these?
 
Having the red and white was Brandon's idea (kind of like the symbol from Resident Evil), and the fabric was all from Wal-Mart. No need to spend a ton of money on fabric that will most likely end up stained from food, especially if it is for the purpose of practice.
 
After doing the straight lines, it seemed boring so I tried the coil. Well, I was so sick of the thread breaking that I gave up for a while. Until yesterday... I decided to give it a go with the coil and it finished without the thread breaking! Ecstatic as I was I decided to do the last one, but did not want to do the coil. That was boring, going around and around and around, over and over and over...
 
So I decided to try something along the lines of what I want to do for Nikolai's quilt. I found the idea through Freemotion Quilting Project, called Sea Oats. I set up the machine for the new mat and started and I was so excited! The thread didn't break once and I got through two if the white triangles. I had no idea what to do for the red triangles, asked Brandon what he thought. After some discussion, he cut out a template which I used to trace with chalk. It worked so well! I am so excited!
 
I had one little hiccup with the bobbin thread, but it is ok. It still looks pretty. :) Even the back of it looks nice (so much nicer than the coil or boring straight lines). Here is a picture of the back, I hope that you can see the design ok...
 
 
I am excited. They look fairly nice on the table, and are fun to eat with.
 
I have enough of the backing fabric to make two more. It is still hanging on my project wall. But I think right now I am just going to admire that last one that I did. So proud!
 
 I still don't think I completely understand the purpose of a place mat. But it was fun! :)

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