How to Make a Group Quilt

Making a quilt together with a group is just a down right good time.

It is.

I love it.

I have no idea how many times I have put together a quilt with a group of women, youth, or family members. But what I do know is that by now I have it down to a science….one that makes it easy for anyone to participate in…and makes it simple for me to get the quilt finished up and off to the person who the group made it for.

Here’s what I do:

First of all I use Cluck Cluck Sew’s fabulous Heart Block Pattern:

And I print out a few copies to use with the group as a reference.

(To find that awesome printable pattern just click HERE.)

Next I choose the size block we are going to be making and get to prepping:

Depending on the size and skill level of my group I will either take fabric and cutting tools and assign people to cut the small squares, the large squares, and the rectangles….or….

I will precut all the rectangles and squares so they are ready to go once everyone is gathered together to make the blocks.

Now it is time to set up your group working stations:

A cutting station: If you do not have precut the fabric…it works best to have someone cutting all the small squares…someone cutting all the large squares…someone cutting all the rectangles…and someone cutting all of the sashing. And then regardless of precut fabric or not you will need someone to trim and square up the finished blocks.
A sewing station: I find, as with the cutting, it is best separate the jobs. So I assign one person to sew a small square onto each rectangle, one person to sew a large square onto each rectangle, and one person to sew each pair of rectangles together.
A pressing station: Assign someone to press the back and front of each block to make them nice and crisp!

The station system works well…after the cutting gets going everyone stays busy and can chat while they work…and I usually float around between stations making sure that everyone is doing ok and helping when and where it is needed.

The great thing about using these blocks when working together as a group is that not only are the blocks easy to construct, which they are, but you can choose the finished size of the quilt by how many blocks that you create.

So, as a group you can quickly create a baby quilt, lap quilt, throw, or one large enough for a bed.

And whatever size you make it will be wonderful because people working together to make quilts make memories and magic!

It’s true!

And whoever receives that magical quilt will feel the love.

They will.

Happy Quilting!

***Other thoughts:

*If you have a group of quilters you can ask them to bring their own piece of red or pink fabric (or whatever color scheme you are working with) to cut and use in the quilt. This is a great way to have everyone contribute and since the rectangles needed for a heart block aren’t large most quilters will have scrap pieces they can bring.

*I would suggest buying the white that you use for the sashing and border rather than use scraps…especially scraps that others contribute…just to make sure that the white all matches (is the same shade) and unifies the quilt rather than distracting from the hearts.

*It is always helpful to have a sewn block to take as an example to show what the finished blocks will look like. This will help not only as the blocks are being sewn together: