My mother-in-law made quilts and she made table mats; some were quilts and some were appliqué. When we were going through her house after she died I came across a table mat top that she had made but not turned into a mat. It matched a set and a valance that she had in the kitchen which my sister-in-law had chosen to keep. I do not know if she had made five and chosen her favourite four to make into mats or if she was going to make a number of them to give as presents but changed her mind. Whatever the reason, it was something that she had decided to not work on any more but had kept. I decided to keep it although it was very unlikely that I would turn it into a table mat.
It was in the back of my mind that it would make a good project bag. But what size and style as I did not want to lose the integrity of the patchwork. I decided on a zippered bag, the short length of the piece being the width of the bag and bought a zipper when I had a 60% coupon. I, also, wanted to make it slightly bigger as I thought I might box the corners. As the top had some blue in it I chose some blue fabric to add to the top.
I made a number of mistakes in the making of the bag. None of which are obvious to anyone except me and all were remedied or became a “design feature”. (LOL seriously.) The first mistake involved cutting the zipper and might have necessitated another trip to JoAnns. I was on the telephone when I cut the end of the zipper because I thought I could carry on while talking – no. I forgot to open the zipper before cutting so ended up with the pull on the cut off piece. Luckily I had already cut the bottom end off so I was able to put the tab back on. The other silly mistake I made was cutting the lining. I kept the top in one piece but cut the lining in two pieces each half the size of the top. I’d forgotten that the lining would have a seam at the bottom and I didn’t add extra length on to each piece to allow for this. When I was sewing the side seams the top was bigger than the lining and I had to make a pleat at the bottom. This actually turned out well because now the bottom of the bag is slightly boxed and I didn’t box the corners further. Thus you can see all of the patchwork that my mother-in-law made. There was another major mistake I made involving the zipper and extra fabric which I won’t go into but it was a good learning lesson if I want to include the design feature in another bag.
Despite the mistakes I am really pleased with it and it is a good memory of my mother-in-law which I don’t think I would have had as a table mat and definitely not if I had kept it sitting in my fabric stash.
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