Placemat cutting

I spent most of yesterday in the basement making soap....10.5 pounds of soap! That was 3 big batches and I'll get a photo after I uncover them. They have to be kept insulated for the first 24 hours. But, trust me, it's a lot of soap. I donate about half of it, sell a little and the rest is for me, family, and a couple of friends. 

After the soap was cleaned up, I  made lotion and that was about all my energy for the day. I got a little motivated after dinner and decided to clean off the cutting table from all the placemat fabrics that I pulled yesterday. It only took about an hour and a half and now I have placemat kits and a clean cutting table.
​

The fishes got paired with a shibori. I even cut the binding for each kit. I have 4 of these and will need to dye matching napkins. I'd like to get this set done before the beach because I think my brother or nephew will want them. But Chris would like them too.

For the rest of these I only had 2 napkins and 1 fat quarter so each set will be only 2 placemats, plenty for me and Chris. The nice thing about "special" fabrics is that you don't need to do much with them. Just add a little accent and enough fabric to get to the target size and they are done. 
​

This is one of my all-time favorite fabrics. It was done with glue resist and dyed at least twice. The top/bottom fabric is a sample that I made for a customer YEARS ago and I'm happy I've found a home for it. I also have 2 more napkins out of the overdyed napkin bin. A friend gave me bags of napkins many years ago that she collected from thrift stores. I often put them in with gradients  on the edges of the bin to soak up run-off dye. I've used tons of them but still had an overstuffed bin. I can now, finally, close the lid on that bin.
​

I know that I dyed this fabric with my friend when we were doing monthly "technique exploration days". We tried everything (shibori, batik, printing, screen printing, stenciling, sun printing.....)  and we both ended up with some fun fabrics. This one was done during the dextrin resist exploration. I was lucky to find 3 fabric bits in my stash that would work with it.

All of these are set aside for sewing. It probably won't take an hour to stitch then all. I think I'll look for a backing scrap that's bing enough for all 10 of the so I can load and quilt them on the longarm all at once. 

​What I know for sure is that if I don't get them done before the beach, they will likely wait a while. After the beach I want to get started on the Goldfinch quilt. Today (and maybe this weekend) I'll be quilting the baby quilt for Mom after Chris and I do a little kayaking on the lake. It's going to be a beautiful day to be outside.