Princess Castle Quiet Mat

Prepare for a lot of pictures in this post, because I couldn't get enough of this quiet mat!  I made it for a friend's daughter and it was so much fun creating something girly for a change :)  I had to take a ton of pictures before I let it go!

Instead of folding up into a book, this mat folds up into a cute little purse!  It is secured with a velcro strap, and I also sewed a small mirror into the top of the mat.  There are three princesses to play with and they are stored in little pockets behind the towers and the main door.  The princesses are cut from Ann Kelle's fabric line for Robert Kaufman, and I ironed them onto heavy interfacing for structure.

There are four little "fairy tale" icons hidden behind the towers windows.  The middle pink turret is also a pocket that can store small accessories like bracelets and hair clips.

Felt Pizza Play Food

Instructions

Supplies

For this project I used the following supplies:

• 3 sheets of tan felt
• 1 sheet each of white, red, green and beige felt
• Embroidery floss in white, tan, red and green
• Two pieces of card stock.  

Prep and Cutting

I made a pattern for the pizza by tracing a 10 inch circle onto two pieces of card stock, then cutting that circle into four quarters.  I used the quarter pieces as patterns to cut out the pizza slices, and later sandwiched the cardstock in between the felt layers to give the pizza slices more stability.  Using one of the slice patterns, I cut out 8 pieces of tan felt (2 per slice) and 4 pieces each of white and red felt (1 per slice).  I cut a few inches off the top of each white piece and cut a wavy edge to look like cheese.

For the crust, I cut four semi-circles out of my remaining tan felt using the slice patterns as a guide. For the toppings, I chose to make pepperoni, green peppers and mushrooms.  Cut two circles out of red felt for each pepperoni, three small strips out of green felt for each pepper, and two small mushroom shapes out of beige felt for the mushrooms.

Pizza

For each pizza slice, I started by layering the white cheese on top of a red piece of felt and a tan piece of felt.  I sewed the three layers together only going around the white shape with a blanket stitch.  Next, I added a piece of cardstock and another piece of tan felt to the bottom of that, and added a piece of crust along the top edge.  I blanket stitched around the crust shape, going through all layers of felt and cardstock, then blanket stitched down the two remaining sides of the pizza slice.  I trimmed down the cardstock patterns first to make them a little smaller than each pizza slice so I wouldn't be pushing my needle through them.

Toppings

All of the toppings were easy to make, once everything was cut out! The pepperonis and mushrooms are just two layers of each shape, blanket stitched together.  The peppers are each made from three strips of green felt.  Start by lining up the ends of two strips, and sewing a few stitches through to secure them together.  Then, line the third strip up to one of the free ends, and sew those together.  Lastly, take the two remaining ends and sew them together with a few stitches.  It should look like a warped triangle, and when you turn it inside out it curls into a little pepper shape.