Home a la mode: A Tea Party...Tutorial

Hey there! I wanted to share a Tea Party Play mat that I made for my little one. She is the quintessential princess. She wakes up and puts on her tiara and starts her day. Well, any princess worth her salt has tea parties. Her Mima bought her a tea set. I was watching her play one night and thought she needed a little play mat to go along with it. Here is a tutorial that I came up with on the fly.

Supplies
8 Fabric pieces from Gypsy Girl Layer Cake
1/2 yard of coordinating fabric for sashing
1 yard of fabric for backing
1 yard of Fusible Fleece
!/2 yard of fabric for binding...I used 45" Gypsy Girl Wishing Well Blue
1/4 yard of Wonder Under

I was making this up as I went along...so not all the fabrics were pictured at first.

Start by picking 4 pieces of the layer cake to make your hearts. I used a heart shape cookie cutter I had as a pattern.

I just cut a piece big enough to trace the heart onto from each of the 4 pieces. If you look real close you can see the Wonder Under underneath the fabric. Cut pieces of that to be ironed on to the back of your squares and apply with a hot iron.

Trace your heart onto each of the 4 pieces of fabric

I used a black marker so you could see my tracing.

Repeat for all four squares

Next you want to iron each heart onto the remaining layer cake pieces.

For the sashing...I cut 2.5" strips from my coordinating fabric. I cut the strips a little larger than the layer cake squares. I like to trim and square up after I have sewn things together. So, since the squares are 10" I cut the strips 11" tall. Start with 2 2.5" x 11" strips.

See how the strip is a little longer that the square.

Sew the strips into the middle of 2 square using a 1/4" seam. Again, the strips will be longer than the squares. Press your seams towards the squares.

Trim the piece so that all sides are even.

Now you want to cut 3 strips 2.5" x 23". Sew these strips to the top middle and bottom of your squares.

When I was pinning my piece together...I laid my bottom piece on top of the top piece so I could line the center sashing up.

Here is a close up of lining up the centers. Sew the strips on and again, press all seams towards the sqaure pieces. Once you have done this, trim off any excess fabric and square up sides.

Cut 2 2.5" x 28" strips. Sew these to the sides of your mat.

Trim and Press

Place your mat on top of your fusible fleece. Trim the fleece so that it is an inch longer on all sides than the mat. I do this to all for some give during quilting.

Fuse the fleece to your mat top.

Layer your backing fabric and mat together and start your quilting. I went with a very simple design. I felt like I wanted each square to be like a placemat.

Here is a close up of what I did. I placed a zig zag stitch around each heart...and also added a little machine embroidery to each corner.

As far as the edges of the mat...I like to place a zig zag stitch around the perimeter. This holds all the layers together and makes it much easier to add your binding.