Pinwheel Quilt - step by step

I'm making a pinwheel play quilt for a friend who is about to have a baby. I'm trying to remember my steps as I do certain blocks to make it easier the next time I do them. Doing pinwheels goes faster than other blocks and I love the way they look, especially for kids.

Here I've added the photos of how I start. I've cut all my pieces by figuring out how many times I use a specific fabric and then cutting TWO squares of 6 7/8" for each 12" block in which I'll use it. I cut those diagonally in half. I lay out each block as it will appear and pin the triangles of coordinationg light/dark fabric (i.e., the ones that will go together to make up the upper-right quadrant, lower-right, lower-left & upper-left) right sides together along the longest edge. I then chain-piece sew them with 1/4" seam allowance. Chain piecing helps soooo much. It makes it go much faster.

My least favorite part of quilting is cutting fabric. I'm not as accurate as I'd like to be so I often overestimate and then trim down/square up afterwards. To do it all at once requires patience on my part, but it also gets it all done with in one go!

So you can see the chain piecing and the I cut the threads, remove the pins and stack the pieces. Then I iron the quadrants open, seam allowance going towards the dark half of the quadrant, and place them on the cutting mat to trim off the tags or tails. You can do the two tags of each quadrant at once, but be careful to make sure the edge of your ruler lines up with the entire edge of your quadrant so you don't trim the tails on a curve. When in doubt, trim less than more.

I then lay out each quadrant as it will be sewn to make the block. And take the upper-right quadrant, lay it, right sides together, on the upper-left quadrant and pin along the adjoining side. You will sew down this side with 1/4" seam allowance to make 1/2 of your block. I usually do this to all the blocks at once, allowing me to chain-piece sew them again and save some time. I lay out each block as I want it to look because I can get confused at to which piece joins which and on what edge. This way, although it is a bit time consuming, I make less mistakes.

I'll upload the rest of my process once I'm done sewing the blocks together to make the top of the quilt!

Sam's Quilt sans Binding

Here is the quilt I made for my good friend's 3 year old, Samantha. She is adorable and spirited and smart and I love her. I wanted to make her something for her "big girl bed" so I made a little bigger than the average baby quilt. I incorporated a lot of my favorite kid's fabrics into this one. I made mistakes, as usual, but all in all it's a pretty darn fun and pretty quilt. I hope she gets a lot of fun times out of this one.

G'night!

Skull Kitty Blanket - and Machine Binding on BOTH Sides

I'm teaching myself how to machine bind the front AND back of quilts... previously I have machine sewn the binding to the front of the quilt and hand sewn the binding on the back. It works just fine, but it takes FOREVER. And as my sewing schedule begins to increase I can't take 5 hours to sew the binding on one quilt. 20 mins is much better. But, like everything else in life, it takes practice. So I decided to make a quick kitty blanket to test out my sewing on. I will be making another one with the same fabric now that I've used this one as my experiment (my cats will be the lucky recipients of this treasure).

This kitty blanket is made with one of my favorite skull-themed fabrics with roses and hearts, and the backing is a thick, fleece with girlie skulls on it. It has batting in the middle and is really soft.

Now onto finishing Sam's quilt! I have promised to hand it off to her on Sunday... and one does not promise something lightly to a 3-year old. I'll post photos of it soon - it's all done except the binding.

Pssst.

Two more blocks are done. Made a mistake with one, but there you go. No time to stop and go back! One more block and we're on to finishing the quilt top etc. That's tomorrow. It's off to improv practice tonight!

Sssshhh! More blocks for the surprise quilt!

And now I'm going to bed after working on it for 12 hours approx.
Busy days coming up and I'm worried I won't finished. But I did 6 of 9 blocks today, so that's a start!

G'night.

Zoe's Baby Quilt is finished!

Way overdue, but it's done.

Now I'm going to do a queen sized quilt on commission for the same friend who asked me to do this one. And this time I'm going to do it quickly. You'll see!