Project Photos: Undercover Maker Mat

I originally found the pattern for the Undercover Maker Mat on Pinterest, and have finally managed to finish sewing my own! It comes from the blog lillyella by Nicole Young and you can see her post and get free pattern HERE. The mat doubles as both a sewing machine cover and a pocket filled organizer to keep all your notions et cetera at hand as you work.

This was a bit of a stash busting project, which required a bit of editing from the pattern. This was almost entirely made up of test swatches which are approximately 8" x 8". The obvious thing  to do was try and break each swatch down into blocks of 4" x 4", but since they end up being slightly less than that, I decided to do a bit of fussy cutting to make 2 slightly larger blocks using the unprinted white space to remain attached in the seam allowance.

Here is my rough plan of how to assemble my new pattern. The dimensions changed to 20" x 28" for each side before sewing and seam allowances. It was only a basic guide to getting her pattern to be divisible by 4" and fitting more comfortably around my old Bernina. The pockets stayed the same, and I added an accent swatch onto the opposite end so both sides would look interesting when it was being used as a dust cover.

Calavera in a Sombrero

Another of the changes that I made was to remove the need for bias tape or bound edges, and replacing that with lace on the pockets.

Golden Cat Grass Damask
Clocks and Flower Background
Multiple White Gold Rose Borders

Maya Ball Players Linen
Arabesque Medallions Gold
Snow White
Vineyard Damask Nouveau Red

The way this worked was by piecing together each side, top and bottom, and with right sides together, pockets and ties in place, sewing around the edges leaving a space for turning on one side. Emma made sure to lay on the completed blocks while I was trying to get this step done.

After sewing these together, I added a thick layer of padding made of fabric doubled over a few times and stitched around the edges. This padding layer is standing in for batting, and I left the pocket area open to cut down on the bulk. This was affixed with a zigzag stitch along the seam allowance of the main body of the mat, and everything got turned the right way out before quilting.

Just a cheap checked fabric from my stash.

Here is the full view of the finished top,

and the underside that won't really be seen all that much.

Quilt label that was ladder stitched on after most of the photos were already taken.

 The thread catcher is a great feature to the design. The way I did mine was to piece together several swatches before cutting out the specified shapes. The lining is the only place in the ensemble that I used satin swatches. It's easier to empty the threads and fabric bits that will accumulate from a slippery satin rather than a courser cotton. So instead of mixing red and gold designs like on the mat itself, this ended up with the red on the exterior and gold on the inside.

My thread catcher featuring my Vampire and Red Ink Splatter III. designs on the front,

and the back of the thread catcher using Ink Splatter II. Red and White.

And the lining from my Confetti Triangles swatches.