Another DIY for your home. I tried this out a few weeks ago. This is a fairly simple project as I try to keep all my DIY’s easy for anyone to tackle. Lets see what supplies you will need.

Supplies:

-1 1/4 yard of Burlap fabric  (Joanns, will make about four placemats)

-Scissors

-Black fabric paint

-Foam brush

-Stencil letters or Critcut Machine

-Yard stick

-Fray Block (Joanns, ‘Tailor Fray Block’ its in a purple tube by the sewing supplies/buttons)

-safety pins or fabric pins

-cardboard (for underneath your project to keep paint off your surface)

After you have gathered all your supplies, you can wash your burlap (here) to be a little more soft and get rid of any loose fabric. I used this same tutorial she posted to wash, dry and iron my burlap. Let me say it sounds scary since, yes, burlap shreds away easily, but its not all that scary.  My husband did freak out a little when he saw it in the washing machine, but it came out just fine. Once you have wash, dried and ironed your burlap you can proceed with the following steps.

1. Cut your burlap to the desired size. Do not forget to cut the burlap the correct way. Measure the size of placemat you want with your yard stick. Simply pull out a thread of burlap, you can see by the tip of my scissors where I pulled it out. Then cut along that line. This will help keep your burlap cuts very even and not zig-zagged.

2. I only made 4 placemats, you can make any number you would like. (you may need more burlap) You will get your ‘fray block’ and follow the directions on the tube. This product helps prevent the edges of your placemats from fraying. Once you have let this dry a few minutes, you will stencil your words. I chose EAT, DRINK, CHOW AND YUM. You can chose other words or use mine on your placemats.

3. Get your paint and foam brush ready. I put the words in the lower right corner of each placemat. In this case, I did the words backwards so I did not go over the wet paint. Example, when I used the stencil and paint for the word YUM, I did the M first. After the M, I moved slightly to the left and did the U and so on. Gently dab the paint onto the burlap. I pre-cut my letters on the Critcut, but you can also use store bought stencil letters. Be sure to pin down the letters so they do not move while you are painting that letter.

4. Once you have painted all your words onto your placemats, you are done! Put them on your table and admire your awesome job!

I am planning on putting these on our new farmhouse table. My to do list of DIY projects continues and first on the list is to make our new table. Keep a look out for that DIY project in the future.

Happy Place-matting!

Jessica