Placemats for Steph and Todd

My sister-in-law and her significant other have a beautiful fiestaware collection. They did not have placemats for their dining, and I got excited about making them lovely placemats to coordinate! They requested 4 placemats, and after playing around with several ideas, I decided to make each placemat a brilliant color in the hopes they could mix and match their dishes to make bright, happy meal settings!

Placemats After Quilting / Before Binding

To pick colors, I went to my fabric stash and pulled down all my bins. I quickly knew that I would make a red, green, and yellow placemat. I settled on purple as the fourth (the eggplant fiestaware color just might be my favorite…). Once I had a happy mix of colors, I focused on one placemat top at a time. For each placemat I used different piecing and patterns – whatever seemed to suit the colors. I then quilted based on the pattern of each. I had a blast making these, and I super love the photo Steph sent showing off two in use!

I final trimmed each placemat to 17″ x 13″, but they will shrink a bit after they get washed the first time.

Oddly enough (for me), I think my favorite placemat is the red placemat. It was the last one I pieced together, and I just really like the way it turned out.

My husband’s favorite is the yellow placemat. The subtle sun burst echoed by the quilting really seems to please him. I’ll have to keep that in mind.

The green placemat was a surprise. I started out with a “pick up sticks” theme and ended up with this top that looks a lot like a present wrapped in ribbon to me. I tried to echo the ribbon theme in the quilting.

Last, but not least, is the first placemat I made. I love the fabrics in this top and I like the way it turned out to be an asymmetrical top. I typically like a lot of symmetry, so this is a bit of a fun departure for me.

Lovely Dinner Setting

Front of Red Placemat

Back of Red Placemat

Front of Yellow Placemat

Back of Yellow Placemat

Front of Green Placemat

Back of Green Placemat

Front of Purple Placemat

Back of Purple Placemat