Sewing Machine Mat with Pockets

Over the years, I have seen quilters make sewing machine mats with pockets in them to set their sewing machines on.  I have always thought them cute, and have always wanted to try making one.

Saturday I was junkin’, and while I always sort through the fabric bin (there can be anything in there), I found two cute homemade quilted placemats. The gears in my head started grinding, and today, after I finished the binding on Louie’s quilt, and sewed some secret things, I made a sewing machine mat with pockets in about 15 minutes flat from those two cute placemats.

I took the first placemat and set it on the table right side up. I then took the second placemat, and placed it on the table with the backing on the top, directly under the first one. I used the binding on each placemat as my guide for sewing the two together. I actually placed the bindings on top of each other, pinned, and sewed two seams, each toward the edge of each binding. Then I took the bottom of the second placemat, and folded it in half and matched bindings.

                                        Here is what the back looks like.                                        I sewed the side seams of the folded placemat, then sewed four seams (in the ditch of the quilt blocks) and made five pockets. (I poofed them out so you could see them.                                             I don’t normally use this machine much anymore, since I got my Janome, but it will be nice if I ever take my machine to a friends house, or a retreat, and it was fun to actually see that I could make something cute by repurposing two cute placemats. Someone spent some time making those placemats, and lucky for me, they ended up in the bin at Goodwill.                   

Be blessed, and have a wonderful week!

                                                                       Michelle