Welcome to our online tutorial for sewing dinner napkins with mitered corners. This is the same method we use here at Picking Daisies for our signature dinner napkins.
Gather your supplies (*We have kits available which include the items marked with a "*")
Sewing Machine
Iron
Cutting Mat
Ruler
Rotary Cutter
Scissors
*Cotton Quilt-weight fabric 44" wide (1.75 yards makes 6 dinner napkins)
*Coordinating polyester thread
*Fabric Marking Pen
*Point Turner
*(optional) 1/2" x 20"+ template for ironing hems
Pre-wash, dry and iron your fabric to prepare for cutting.
Once ironed, fold selvage to selvage on the cutting mat.
Using your ruler and template, cut through the two layers of fabric to make two 20" squares. Repeat for the remaining fabric until you have cut out all of your 20" squares.
Making cocktail napkins? Cut 12.5" squares.
Working with one square of fabric at a time, iron your hems on all four sides as follows...
Grab your fabric marker and open up an ironed corner.
Working from the wrong side of the fabric....
Using a point turner, carefully, yet thoroughly,
turn those corners out to make them nice and square.
You are now ready to sew the final seam around the perimeter of the napkin. We just start right in, but if you are new to sewing napkins, you might find it helpful
to re-iron or perhaps, pin down the seams first.
About
1/8" from the folded edge (or closer if you are brave!), and without back stitching, sew around the entire perimeter of the
napkin, stopping with your needle down at each corner seam so that you can raise your
sewing foot to turn the corner.
When you reach the spot where you began, rather than back stitching, just carefully sew about 1/2" down right over the seam where you started sewing.
If you have an edge-stitch or stitch-in-the-ditch foot, experiment using it to give you more accurate straight lines.
Have fun including some personalized labels to make these your own signature napkins.
