Week 8: Pretty Patches Placemats and Napkins

I'm in a major stash-busting mood this week.  I need to work on a project that'll significantly reduce the amount of fabric I have.  This week I'll be working on one of the many kits I've purchased over the years, the Pretty Patches Placemats and Napkins kit from Connecting Threads.

Sip of Summer collection from
Connecting Threads

Simple Circles Table Runner Sew and Tell

The Simple Circles Table Runner is one of those projects that is more difficult than it looks, but once you finish it you feel proud of yourself.  For me, the most difficult part was sewing the circles, both the individual circles and also the stitching up of the final pattern.  I did get better with practice, though, and now that I've sewn circles, I feel more confident about sewing curves in any future projects.  I just need to remember what is key to sewing circles:  Pivot!  Pivot!!  PIVOT!!!

Simple Circles Table Runner, Day 8

Day 8?  What happened to getting the project done in one week?  Yes, yes, I know, my deadline slipped.  I feel like I let myself down, but the truth is, things came up and I just couldn't get to it.  But I'm almost finished and I do actually have another project started for Week 3.

Simple Circles Table Runner, Day 7

Very often with sewing projects, you spend more time measuring, cutting, pressing, pinning, clipping, turning, etc., than you do sewing.  This project was no different.  If I were to calculate how much time I spent pressing the muslin, tracing the patterns, trimming the circles, layering the fabric, notching the edges, turning the circles inside out and arranging the circles, I'd find that I had spent less than 10% sitting at the sewing machine.  It's all part of the process, but sometimes I don't feel like I'm accomplishing anything unless I'm actually running the machine.

Simple Circles Table Runner, Day 6

I had some leftover batting from a few projects I had finished before.  Some of the batting was fusible and some of it was not, but it didn't really matter with this project because the batting would be next to the muslin, with the fabric pieces on top of the muslin, so I just used pieces of batting that would fit as many circles as possible.  I was able to fit all six of the smallest circles onto one of the larger pieces of fusible batting.

Simple Circles Table Runner, Day 3

A layer cake is a set of fabric, normally of a fabric collection, with each fabric "layer" pre-cut to 10"x10".  Layer cakes from Moda usually have 42 swatches, although other fabric manufacturers' 10" pre-cuts may have a different quantity.  A fat eighth is a one-eighth yard of fabric that is cut to measure about 9"x22", instead of 4.5"x42".