DIY Car Mat Tutorial

While searching for birthday presents for my now three year old, I came across an adorable felt car mat.  Since my little one has been into cars lately, I thought it was such a cute idea.  Once I looked at the price I thought, no way, I can definitely make that.

After a bit of research for ideas on Pinterest, I knew this was something I could tackle easily and you can too!  I set off to find my felt.  When it was all said and done, I paid about $8 for all the felt.  I bought a yard of green felt, half yard of gray felt and a bunch of individual felt pieces in all different colors.   I also got foam letter stamps (more on that later) but those are optional.

So, here’s a quick tutorial.  This is more just to use as guidance to get started.  Use your creativity and come up with a mat unique to your little one’s taste.

First, take your green felt and cut it in half.  You want to make two squares that are the same size.  I think my finished size was roughly 36” X 36”. Set one piece aside.

Lay out your piece of green felt nice and flat.  Then make a plan for your roads.  For mine, I started by cutting two long strips from my gray felt to form a cross right through the middle of my “town”.  I made these strips twice the size of my girlie’s cars so it could be a two way street.  At first, I thought that I would sew everything down so all my streets are sewn on.  Once I got to the buildings, I decided sewing everything would take a lifetime so I switched to hot glue.  Either way, both work well.

After I made the two larger streets, I filled in my four squares with smaller roads.  I simply laid my piece of gray felt on top of one of the squares and drew a road that would connect to the larger roads.  I also made each square different.  Be creative. :)  Attach your smaller roads using your method of choice.

Once all your roads are on, come up with different buildings/places you’d like to have in your “town”.  I just made a list of all the places we go with my little one.  Then I went to the computer and simply googled all my buildings for a template to copy, such as “museum template” or “museum clipart”.

With all my templates printed, I started to come up with a game plan.  I laid all my pieces out on top of my felt mat and kept rearranging everything until it all fit nicely.  Then I took my individual pieces of felt and decided what colors I wanted everything to be.  Next, start cutting and cutting and cutting. :)

Once everything was cut out, I decided to label some of my buildings.  This step is optional but helps identify your building easier.  I took my foam stamps and simply stamped labels onto the buildings using white paint.  Such as “fire” for the fire station.

Next, glue, glue, glue!  Once everything is glued down, your mat really starts to come together.  You could stop at this point but I felt like it needed something more so I embellished my buildings with doors and windows and made some other little embellishments throughout the town such as stop signs, flowers, trees, etc.  Use your creativity.  If your child is old enough, this is a great point to get them involved.

You’re almost done!  Go find your other piece of green felt that you cut out eons ago because this project takes quite a bit of time.  Place your two squares on top of each other right sides out.  You could skip this step and leave your one piece of felt as is but I felt like this step really completed the look and reinforced the mat.

I had some double fold bias tape on hand but if not, you’ll have to pick up a package in whatever color you’d like.  Using a cup as a template, I rounded the edges of my green pieces of felt to make the corners a bit smoother when attaching the bias tape.  Pin everything together and sew your bias tape in place.

Lastly, I attached a piece of ribbon to the side of my mat so that I could roll it up and tie it together for storage.

Take a deep breath because you are finally finished!  This project took quite a bit of time but it is so simple and easy to create.  For a fraction of what you’d typically buy one for so even better!  If your kids are older, it can be a fun craft for them to help with and use their creativity as well.