When place mats go wrong you get cloth napkins

I am a huge fan of pinterest. I get a lot of my DIY ideas from them but I often fail to realized that the designs and projects I find are often the product of professional crafty individuals. I expect my projects are going to turn out the same and there is just simply no way I could be that good especially considering I don't have the tools required to do the job. I work in EMS and our motto is "adapt and overcome," but I am realizing that DIY is not multi-systems trauma and I can't use duct tape and a rubber ducky to make this stuff work.

This is what I thought my place mats would look like:

As it turns out in the end I got cloth napkins instead. I started with 3 yards (for some unknown reason) of a soft, light burlap-looking fabric, brown and green acrylic paint, paint sponges, faux leather rope and leaf stencils.

I cut the fabric to 17" by 13" and after measuring and re-measuring, I managed to miss cut my place mats 6 times! After butchering the fabric, I was incredibly discouraged. I cleaned up the shreds of fabric and starting watching TV to re-group from this traumatic experience. While I sat on my couch I kept getting this nagging feeling that I could make something out of my mess. Really what I was trying to accomplish was a little character in our dining area. The more I thought about what I wanted our dining area to look like I realize that I had just created our new cloth napkins and napkin holders.


I took one of my unevenly cut place mats, placed them on my table and started brainstorming. I laid my stencils on the fabric, playing with placement ideas. I ended up this this.

Once they were folded up I was presently surprised to see that they didn't look horrible. Then I took my leather rope and braided it into single long strings. The final touch was to wrap the napkins with the rope and add some silverware.

I think they turned out okay. They are going to stay on our table until I come up with a better idea.