Although you can sew a quilt by hand, the process is much more time-consuming and a little more daunting for beginning quilters. One of the easiest quilts for a beginner to make is a simple patchwork quilt. A square patchwork quilt is made of fabric squares that are sewn together in a simple grid pattern. You can cut squares from your own fabrics, or start with a package of pre-cut fabrics called a “bead pack” or “layer cake”.
Simple padding lines can be marked with a ruler and an erasable pencil or pen, or tailor's chalk applied against the edge of the adhesive tape strips. The tools used for quilting may seem intimidating at first, but you only need a few simple supplies to get started. The binding gives the quilt the finished look you want, with a soft border around the tile. Splitting Squares is a beautiful patchwork quilt that will take beginners through the steps.
It is designed to cut and join a lap quilt from the first step to the last. This post is not exactly a complete pattern, but rather an explanation of the method needed to create a quilt of your own. You don't even need a sewing machine, it's possible to make a whole quilt by hand, with the added advantage of being very therapeutic. Early quilters used to make bed covers, and quilts often figured in medieval house inventories.
Similar to normal paper pieces, English paper pieces are a traditional quilting style that uses shapes with many sides, such as hexagons. Some of them have been sewing clothes and bags and want to expand into quilting and others are new to sewing. If the ends of the threads are on the sides of the quilt, you can leave them, since the binding will fix them later. Depending on the size of your squares, you can make it as a baby quilt, up to a large 80″ by 80″ quilt.
The Hashtag quilt, seen above, is a jelly roll quilt that incorporates the ease of joining the strips together with the use of a pre-cut jelly roll fabric package. Cut a piece of wadding 1 inch larger than the quilt block you want to make and press the filling into quarters to find the center. This post has a lot of information about straight-line quilting, from how to plan your design and tools to help you sew a straighter line. Quilters use these skills to make beautiful heirloom quilts, lap quilts and mini quilts, as well as quilted clothing and smaller household items, from cushions to tables.
Because of all this talk about quilts, I have received a lot of messages from people who want to learn how to make quilts.
