Tuesday, September 1, 2015

The Drawstring Play Mat


Hello Readers. Today's project is a play mat for my little guy. He is 5 months old and needs a soft place to play. It started with this mauve Christmas tree skirt. I am not a big fan of mauve, and I already have a tree skirt we use every year. This circle shape is great and the material is in wonderful condition.


I am going to cover the mauve material with this cute blue and green flannel. It is super soft and will be nice for my Sweet Pea while he learns to roll over and crawl.


I started by folding the quilted piece in half and spreading it out on the edge of the fabric for cutting.


I did some cutting. Cut, cut, cut. I made a half circle around the quilt with a 1" seam allowance.


Here is my second half circle. I put them together and sewed down the middle to make a full circle.


Once I sewed it onto mauve side the quilt, I had to cut off the excess hanging off all around. 


Cut, cut, cut. Below you can see how the edge shows just a tiny bit of the mauve. That's OK. I have a plan for that.


Here is the extra bias tape my sweet daughter made for a past project. I pinned it all the way around the circle. It covers all the fabric edges that I don't want seen.


Here is the bias tape being sewn to the play mat. It's pretty boring. Sew, sew, sew...


Here is the coolest part of the mat. I threaded satin ribbon through the inside of the bias tape. It goes all around the mat and when you pull on it, it turns into a bag to hold the toys. That means easy clean up and easy traveling with all those toys you MUST take to grandma's house. If you are worried the string could get caught on something, or be dangerous to your baby, you can leave it out.


Here is the mat pulled tight like a bag. I can fit so many toys and stuffed animals in here. I saw something similar on Pinterest long ago. I didn't need baby things then. I remembered the drawstring and this project just came together.  


Here is a cute baby on the mat so you can see how that works too. Thanks for reading. Now, go out there and make something fabulous!