I first starting making a quilt when my oldest was just a baby. I was looking for something to do every day that couldn’t be undone and I saw a lady at church who had made a beautiful faux chenille quilt for her grandbaby. So, I got up enough nerve to ask her to show me how to do it, borrowed my mother-in-law’s sewing machine, went and bought fabric and made one. I think it was the worst thing I have ever made—but I was so proud of it. Yes, the seams were wonky, the binding looked so bad (I am laughing thinking about it) but it was something I made. And I knew that my junior high sewing skills were coming back. It was the start of something good…..
If that is you…I promise that you can do it too. Yes, your seams may not be perfect on your first quilt, but I can promise that you will be proud of it. And it will be beautiful.
Today we are going to start Day 1 of our quilt along. I have tried to break it up into manageable chunks, so you only have to spend about an hour or so a day and and finish a quilt top in 3 days.
Does that sound like a plan?
Here is what the overall pattern will look like. If it doesn’t make sense yet….it’s okay, it eventually will.
The finished quilt is 50 x 70 inches.
Supplies:
*10– fat quarters or 1/4 yards of fabric
(I used this Indian Summer Bundle from Shay) with 3 other scrap fabrics that I had)
*2 yards of white broadcloth (I used Kona Cotton in White)
3.5 yards of backing fabric
2/3-1 yard of binding fabric
*white thread
*sewing machine
*cutting mat
*cutting ruler
*rotary cutter
If you have never cut fabric straight before—do not fear, but I am going to send you to a Video to show you how to do it. It’s hard to explain in pictures and in 4 minutes she does a fantastic job. Here are the measurements that you are going to need to cut from your fabric pieces.
And here are the measurements that you will need to cut from your white fabric.
You will need to cut a few more pieces out of the white fabric, just in case you are wondering why you have so much white leftover. These pieces will be the borders in between your quilt rows and the borders around the outer edges of your quilt. They are called sashings….and I like to cut these after you have finished sewing my rows together. So, I will show you how to do that on day 3 when we put together the quilt blocks.
And there you have it! Your quilt pieces are all stacked up and ready to go…..see you Wednesday for our piecing tutorial!
~Elizabeth
oh i love it…and that picture is just too cute!
Such a sweet and simple pattern! I love it! What are the finished dimensions of the quilt? I’m sorry if it is posted somewhere and I’m missing it. Thanks!!
Sorry I will put that in. It is approximately 50×70 inches.
Thank you! I was looking for a project and now I have one!
OoooOOooh, I love what’s going on here! Can’t wait to see more!!
Oh I love this! And I just won some fat quarters that will be perfect for this! I know I won’t be able to sew in real time with you but will have to reference this series. 🙂
the math doesn’t add up for me…if the squares are 4″ how do you get 50″ out of that…4 x 5 across =20 + 8″ sashings…
but I see 7/5 squares. what’s with the gray diagram?
To clarify, from the white you need 28 7 1/2 x 2 1/2, right? Because the picture says 2 2/12.