The Partner Placemat

For the last Project Quilting challenge I made a placemat for our dear friend John. I’d also started a second one for his former wife, with whom he is still very close. Here it is.

Partner placemats. Sharing similar characteristics but able to stand alone as well, as good friends do.

Like John’s I did the Irish Chain block for Pat’s. Like John’s, hers has stars using the triangle-in-a-square block. They share a common colour: green. They share Cypress but she has Leprechaun. However, you can see that where his used purple for the stand alone triangle, hers used the background fabric and I used green for the side triangles. Same exact block just coloured differently! Pat's favourite colour is red.

As with John’s I used my Wonder Triangles by Marti Michell to cut the triangle pieces, and like his, sewed the placemat on my Featherweight.

Webbing in progress

I did a fade in Pat’s placemat as well, going from lightest salmon-red, Kona Punch, to orange-red and true red through the centre. The red-orange and red are quite close in value and shade.

Flimsy complete

I quilted them very similarly, stitching in the ditch, diagonal lines through the 9-patch blocks and dot-to-dot work in the stars. 

Here is the back, so like John’s, it’s reversible. 

Disaster struck after I washed it by hand—not then, but when I pulled it out of the ten minutes in the dryer. I was horrified to see the red had run. I knew one of the reds was bleeding because the sink water had a pinkish tinge but after air-drying for 15 minutes there was no bleeding so I thought all was fine. Nope. 

I should have taken a picture but I was a bit panicked and quickly got the Blue Dawn and ran a sink of hottest water. Into the sink it went held down by several heavy items like our soap dispenser, toothbrush holder and another heavy glass dish. It soaked for about an hour and then I careful lifted it up and was overjoyed to see that the Blue Dawn trick from Save My Bleeding Quilt had worked once again. 

I am not positive which red ran but I’d lay my last dollar on the solid I bought at the big box F-store. 

I like thinking of them having a coffee or sharing a meal from time to time using their placemats!

Quilt Stats:

Pattern: my own design using the Irish Chain block

Size: 12”x 18"
Fabric: scraps and stash

Batting: Cotton

Backing: Northcott Fabrics 

Quilted: on my Bernina

Threads: pieced with Gütermann on Billie, my Featherweight; quilted on my Bernina with Exquisite pale yellow and Isacord red polyester, Aurifil 2908 50 wt pale green and olive green 40 wt

Hope to see you on Wednesday for the Eighth Annual QAL kickoff! Grab the graphic below and post it on your socials if you're in!