THREAD - pretty napkins for dirty mouths

My mom bought some fabric to make nice cloth napkins then promptly broke her wrist doing some whirly dirly dancing. Since I was itching to try a new project (I am developing a knitting claw from making so many pairs of fingerless mittens) and offered to make them for her. I found a great super easy to follow tutorial online from fellow blogger Char Michele.

Here is the tutorial -
http://charamichele.com/blog/2007/12/handmade-cloth-napkins-tutorial.html

A few notes -

1. the pattern calls for 14"x 14" squares to start with - making in the end 13" napkins which are pretty small - really just cocktail size. To make "regular" sized napkins you should start with 20" squares instead.
2. My mom - super organized person that she is - lost the thread that matches the fabric. I just used white but it definitely looked a little sloppy versus having matching thread.
3. Adding together the time it took to iron the fabric, stitch, fold, iron, stitch, fold, iron - 4 sides of six napkins - it took about three hours. I could have done it faster but I was watching some silly romantic comedy at the time too.
   
4. Amy Butler also has a great pattern for napkins - each side is a different fabric. As well as matching place mats. These can be found in her book - In Stitches - which I just bought - yeah!!

Happy Saturday. I'm off to get a manicure. Let's hope the nice lady can unclench my knitting claw long enough to slap some polish on my nails.

B.L.E.