Land that I love

Welcome back to my shamefully abandoned blog! What can I say, life happens.  

I started this map a few months ago.  I saw a few different examples of them on Pinterest, but no directions, so I winged it.  Always a good choice :)

I've had it all ready to stretch over a frame and haven't gotten around to it, 

but today I finished... progress! 

Here's how to make your own:

I grabbed a USA road map by AAA.  

I must be getting old, because in order to see all the boundaries of the states I had to start outlining them in Sharpie.  

And even worse, when I got up to New England, I had to pull out another map for reference! 

Well, now you know.  Geography is not my strength.  

 After I made my lines, I started cutting out all the states.  

Yep, this took a while. 

 Cutting...

 Cutting...

 Big Pile :)
Next I started starching some of my favorite scraps of fabric.

Here comes the tedious part...
Take your states and pin them to a fabric scrap and start cutting, again!

I started laying out the states in map form to make sure they were going to fit together.

I think a cute assistant is a must in this project.  

So here's where I'm missing a few pictures.  

After I had them all laid out I started gluing them with a glue stick to a large piece of muslin.  

I think I started in the middle and worked out so I could keep it even.  

Then, I sewed around each state.  

And I'm sorry to all you Alaskan and Hawaii residents, you didn't quite make it onto the map... 

The last step was to cut a frame out of 1x2's and staple it canvas style onto the frame. 

I was going to make this for the shop, by I'm not sure if I can part with it just yet!  We'll see!

Hope your Christmas and New Years were full of joy and peace.  

Take Care!