My cousin is having a baby in March and the baby shower was this past weekend, I decided to try my hand at sewing a receiving blanket quilt and making a tutu for the baby girl. Quilting looks easy and Joann Fabrics had flannel material on sale for $2.50/yard so figured lets give it a go....needless to say quilting is not as easy as it looks and I learned some VERY valuable lessons I would like to pass on today.
I used 1/3 of a yard of each fabric type, and a 1 1/2 yards of the backing and white squares
Tip 1: Creating your own quilting pattern is not as easy as you may expect, although I was using only four different types of fabric laying out my quilt in a pattern that was perfectly symmetrical (ie having each fabric type represented throughout the quilt and not all on one side) proved to be challenging. Since I am spatially handicapped my wonderful husband helped me with this task and after 1 hour and 30 mins we (he) came up with the perfect mixture.
This is the finished product
Tip 2: CUTTING WITH SCISSORS WILL NOT WORK!! Unfortunately, I learned this the hard way. I figured since I would be sewing the seems that cutting with scissors would be ok, big mistake. Luckily I needed each square to be 6"x6" and I cut each one 7"x7". I took some coupons the next day and went to the store and bought a rotary cutter and mat went back and recut all my pieces to 6.5"x6.5" and they turned out great. I found that by cutting them exactly the same size with the rotary cutter that I could pin them and keep them very straight while sewing and with uneven edges you have no straight edge to keep in line and the pieces come out crooked.
Reverse Side
Tip 3: Start with easy fabrics to work with. How do you know what these are if you have never done quilting before? I am here to tell you that the white bumpy fleece like material I bought for the back and the white squares was not the easiest to work with when you are looking for precision. Due to the stretchy composition of the fabric it was really hard to keep in line and when sewing the back in place my sewing machine had some difficulty getting through the thickness of all of the fabric layers. The flannel sewed like a dream and was very easy to keep in place.
Tip 4: Take the time to pin before sewing. Pinning is one of those tedious tasks that take a considerable amount of time but make all the difference in the finished product. I found with this project anchoring the white fabric with pins on top, bottom and the sides it really helped counteract the natural stretch of the fabric and keep it straight.
This is a simple iron on embellishment from Joann's ($2.99)
Tip 5: Take the time to iron everything. I really enjoy ironing but I do understand that some may find it to be another tedious task. I would recommend ironing the fabric before cutting, the squares before pinning and the seems after sewing. Ironing will help all the seams flatten out and look nice and tight.
If there is any interest in the pattern for this quilt post a comment and I will be happy to post one.
Until next time.....Happy Crafting,
Ashley
I purchased my sewing machine last summer from Bonnie's Sewing Center in Bay City, MI
