Placemats

I spent my day finishing the place mats for my granddaughter. I hope they work out OK. She has a round table and I should have thought about having a look at the table and trying out some of my place mats on it for size. I guess it is too late now. I did cut an inch off the top edge and 1 3/4 inches from the bottom edge to make them smaller. This is the front of one of the place mats. It is the  only shot I got that is fairly true to color. An earlier post has all 4 place mats.

The photo on the right is the back of the place mats. I did not have enough of anything that looked right for binding so I turned these pillowcase style and quilted them. When I use that method I always split the back and leave an opening which I close later.  If I am going to have a seam on the back I might as well put in a couple of stripes.

I don't leave the seam open that I will use for turning; I stitch the whole seam but use big basting stitches for a few inches in the middle of the seam. I press the seam to one side and insert a narrow strip of fusible web and leave the paper on. I stitch around the entire edge and open up the seam and turn the place mat inside out. After all the edges are evened out and pressed I remove the paper from the fusible web andpress to fuse the seam closed. I have a nice neat closed seam that looks just like it was stitched the entire length. I find this much easier than trying to close the seam on the edge by hand so that my opening is invisible. If I do close the seam on the back by hand it is much easier to make it invisible. Sometimes I cheat and sew narrow strips to the front that looks like binding. I do think binding is a nicer finish but in some instances this is a better choice.