My new pressing and cutting board

I am pretty pleased with myself right now.  I made a new little travel pressing and cutting board!  A while ago I had it in my head to do this, and had a couple of pieces of plywood cut to size.  Well, they have been just sitting around, staring at me, for long enough.  I finally got one of them turned into a travel board.  Here, mostly in pictures, is what I did.

I gathered up my supplies.  The above picture just shows what is needed for the board without a cutting mat on the back.  If you decide to do that part, you will need a mat and spray adhesive.  Pictured above are the piece of plywood - mine is about 14"x14", some batting, material to cover it, scissors, construction stapler, and staples - make sure they are not longer than your plywood is deep.

Lay the board on your batting.  My batting was about 4 pieces of a sample stack of batting types I picked up from the Hobbs booth in Paducah one year.  I used only the all cotton pieces.

Trim around the board, leaving about a quarter inch of batting all the way around.

I was going to use plain muslin, but decided I didn't have to!  I picked out a print that I have always liked, that I had in my stash.  I liked this one so much, I had bought a bolt of it from Miller's in Arthur.

Cut your piece of fabric about 3 or 4 inches larger all around the square.  Layer as follows:  material (right side on table), batting, then board.

Bring up one edge and staple to secure.  I used five staples on one side.

Bring material around on opposite side, pulling snug, and staple as you did the other side.

Bring material around on sides and staple.  I folded the corners in a bit and stapled down the excess.

This picture does not show it, but I did trim the excess bit sticking out.  You don't really have to.

Ta-Da!

Now, if you have an old cutting mat that has seen better days, you can make one side a cutting board.

Fortunately, where this mat was cut through it still left enough for me to cover the back of the board.

To be honest, this was the hardest part of the whole project - cutting the cutting mat!  I used old scissors for this job.  I just cut it to fit the back of the board.

I glued it down using spray adhesive.  All done!

I may make a second one just because.