Divokittysmom

Thank you sew much for posting that link!Very informative!! I will be doing this to my cutting mat soon. Just need to get a baby quilt finished first!!

Caroline S

It DOES make a difference. My mat was not able to lay flat in the bathtub so I slid it up and down every so often so all of the surface was able to hydrate. I did not use the vinegar in the water and it turned out fine. Next time I will use the vinegar. I laid it flat on a towel to dry.

nativetexan

yep Olfa hands out info like that at quilt shows. so far, i've not soaked mine and i have had them for yrs and yrs.

alisonquilts

I soaked mine (in just plain hot water, didn't know about the vinegar idea) a couple of days ago because both my mats were yucky. My mats are too big to lie flat in the tub, so I just let them curve, and swooshed them around every now and then, and scrubbed them with an old toothbrush (but I think the vegetable brush idea is better). I was trying to get upholstery fabric threads out of one mat, and school-glue-plus-fuzzies off the other. Both mats feel much better, though I couldn't get all of the upholstery fabric fibres out of the one. They did not stay curved after I removed them from the water, but they were still warm as I dried them with a towel and so at their maximum flexibility...

I use the markings on my mats to measure most of my cuts, so some of the grooves in them are never going to come out, but I did find that soaking them improved their texture markedly.

Alison

twinkie

Great idea. Thanks for Sharing

ccthomas

If you have more than one matt, could you stack them in the tub together?

CherryPie

Thank you for sharing this info....I need to soak mine pretty soon!!

Quilty-Louise

I do so much cutting that I have worn grooves into my mats on
all sides. The only unmarred surface of the mats are about a 3-4"
section in the middle of the mats. I have 5 mats in this condition.

Not sure if this is going to be much help for me, but heck I am willing
to try anything I guess.

Thanks for the link.

Divokittysmom

Here is a tool to help clean our cutting mats from Nancy's Notions!

http://www.nancysnotions.com/product/mat+smoother.do?sortby=ourPicks

Here is a link to sharpening your rotary blades from N N.

http://www.nancysnotions.com/categor...de=NNOADV-1319

Jingle

Good idea, I read this before and of course, forgotten it. I will try it this summer.