I've got so many different things I want to work on before Christmas that I can't afford to work on any new hobbies. I've got the next 4 days off, so it's time for me to buckle up and get my Christmas gifts completed. I did take a break from knitting and went back to sewing earlier. I worked on a set of eight Thanksgiving/Christmas reversible placemats for Mike's mother. Since I usually spend my holidays there and all our visits involve food, it seemed appropriate. Tutorial to come...
I used homemade bias tape for the placemat trim. If you are new to sewing, this is something that you must learn to make on your own. Bias tape is a strip of fabric that is cut along the bias (45 degrees from the selvage-makes it stretchier and easier to work with). It can be used for binding or piping. I bought a Clover bias tape maker for $7 on Amazon and it worked so well. I found two basic ways to make bias tape and I went with the method described in this tutorial How to make bias tape (piecing method). A yard of fabric gave me 56 ft of 1/2" DOUBLE-FOLDED bias tape! It was a bit tedious to cut the fabric and sew it together, but I thought using the actual tape maker was a breeze. The fabric cost me $2 and it had cost me the same amount for a package of 3 yds of bias tape at Joann's. I needed at least 45 ft, so this would have been costly. Aside from how much money you could save, another reason to make your own is that you can make it from virtually any fabric!
Here is a great tutorial on how to attach the bias tape: Bias Tape: How To Make It & Attach It. It tells you how to make the tape as well, but I thought the previous link was better for that.
Here is a great tutorial on how to attach the bias tape: Bias Tape: How To Make It & Attach It. It tells you how to make the tape as well, but I thought the previous link was better for that.
