How to Create Place Mats With Cricut

A Cricut Expression machine has many design possibilities for crafting. It is useful for card making, scrapbook pages and a wide variety of home decor items that would fit anywhere in your home. Create place mats with Cricut, as personal table settings for your family, by cutting a design to stencil on inexpensive canvas fabric. This is a quick design to craft, with no sewing involved. They make wonderful gifts for family, friends and neighbors.

Things You'll Need

• 1-yard canvas fabric, solid color
• Yardstick
• Pinking shears
• Freezer paper
• Scissors
• Home Accent Cricut cartridge
• Cricut Expression machine
• Cricut Expression mat, 12-inch square
• Iron
• Acrylic paint, contrasting color to the canvas color
• Paper plate
• Sea sponge
• Ironing cover cloth

Instructions

1. Measure and cut four canvas rectangles, 14 inches wide by 20 inches long, using pinking shears. Each rectangle is the base for your place mats and the pinked edges provide a finished decorative edge.

2. Cut four strips of freezer paper 2 inches wide by 20 inches long, using scissors. These are the masking borders for stenciling the place mats.

3. Insert the Home Accents Cricut cartridge in your Cricut Expression machine and lay the cartridge overlay over the keypad. Set the cutting blade depth at four.

4. Cut one sheet of freezer paper to fit a 12-inch square Cricut Expression mat. Place the freezer paper, wax side down, on your mat. Hand press to adhere to the tacky surface. Insert the mat in the Cricut machine and press "load paper."

5. Select the lower case "family" key on the key pad. The image will appear on the display. Adjust the size to 2-1/2 inches. Input a quantity of four. Select medium pressure. Press "cut."

6. Place one canvas place mat on your ironing surface with the long edges laying horizontal. Center one "family" cut-out, along the length of the top and a 1/2 inch below the top edge of the place mat. The shiny wax side is facing down. Place the dot, wax side down, over the "i." Iron the cut-out to adhere. Repeat on the remaining three place mats.

7. Position the length of a masking border, horizontally, a 1/2 inch below the ironed "family," with the wax side down. Iron to adhere. This will create a canvas border on the top edge of the place mat with the word "family" in the center. It will protect the rest of the place mat from paint. Repeat on the remaining three place mats.

8. Pour your acrylic paint color on a paper plate. Dip a sea sponge in the paint. Dab the paint over the exposed canvas border, above the masking border. Completely cover "family" and the top canvas border. Allow the paint to dry. Repeat on the remaining three place mats.

9. Peel the masking border and the "family" stencil away from the place mat. Repeat on the remaining three place mats.

10. Place an ironing cover cloth over the painted stencil border and iron to heat set the paint.