There Once Lived...

... a very curious Mousey Mouse. A few to be exact. Who love ride on bikes, sit on chunks of cheese, have tea or watch telly in the afternoon. I adore this lovely fabric with cheeky mice. I was so happy when I found a matching plate, cup and spoon at the Zara Home store that gave me the idea for this project.

Even though this placemat is quite simple, it took me a long while to finish it. I just could not settle on the final design. The reverse applique part was finished really quickly. It was fun picking the "right" mouse for each window, adding the tiny stitches and kisses. The cat followed quite soon after, but I kept thinking of removing it, he seemed to be out of place. Once I added the yellow bowl with milk, I felt better and it all started coming together. If you would like to make some reverse applique, here is a tutorial for you.

I had a small label embroidered in the top left corner that I made late one night and thought it was just perfect. It had a small strawberry on it. But in the morning it seemed so out of place to me that I put the entire placemat on hold and did not get back to it for a while.

A couple of days ago I finally decided that it was time to finish this project. Once I pulled this stripy fabric (Postcards for Santa by Mind's Eye) out for the back of the mat, everything seemed to fall into place. The part with the label was cut off and replaced with a piece of this cotton. It was my Better Half's suggestion to gather the cotton a bit. I never before created this effect, but I really like how it turned out.

While I was playing around with different ideas for a label, I embroidered this simple text in messily printed letters: "There once lived a very curious Mousey Mouse..." it says, that gave a lot of ideas for stories to our not little at all boy. We all had a good laugh.

Using felt along with embroidery is something I would like to explore a bit more. There are some great ideas that this technique could be used for. I bought some wool felt recently and cannot wait to cut into it.

I enjoyed making this ribbon with tiny scraps of linen. A few stitches, two teeny weeny buttons, and two kisses on the other side. If you would like to make similar ribbons/labels, follow this tutorial. So much fun!

This beautiful linen that was used for the mat is a pleasure to work with and looks wonderful with cottons. It came from an online store, Ministry of Fabric. Alisha always has such a wonderful selection of lovely fabrics.

It's almost time for lunch here, I better go and set the table up for our little Mousey Mouse and see what he thinks of his new placemat. Have the most wonderful day! Larisa xox