Saturday, October 3, 2009

Robot Quilt Tutorial



This adorable boy's quilt is a great way to use any fabric with large, feature motifs. You could easily adapt it to be for a girl by changing the fabric. Use more squares to make it twin size. I think five squares by seven squares would be perfect and really make the big square, small square pattern pop more than it does in this simple nine square arrangement. And with that aside, let's begin!

For the larger squares, I fussy cut around robots in a 6 1/2 inch square. For the smaller moon squares I used a 4 1/2 inch square. From your coordinating colored prints cut some strips 2 1/4 inches and the rest 1 1/2 inches wide. Cut long strips of white fabric 3 1/4 inches wide.
Sew the 1 1/2 inch strips onto the top and bottom of the robot squares. I cut pieces by just eyeballing the strips a little larger than needed, sewed them on, pressed the seems to one side, then trimmed them to the correct length.



This gives you the exact length you need and keeps the block nice and square. Next sew two more 1 1/2 inch strips to the two sides of the block. Press and trim. In the same way, sew the 2 1/4 inch strips around the thinner strips which are now around the robot squares.

In the same way, sew the 2 1/4 inch strips around the thinner strips which are now around the robot squares.

To make the smaller, moon squares, sew the 1 1/2 inch strips around the moon square. Then sew the 3 1/4 inch white strips around that. All your squares should be about 11 inches square when they are finished.
When you have completed five robot blocks and four moon blocks you are ready to put together the quilt top. Sew the blocks together according to the layout in the photo. I sewed a 2 1/2 white border on all four sides. Then layer and baste with batting and backing. I pieced my backing with leftover fabric, but you can use whatever you like. I machine quilted my quilt in a large meandering design (which I don't think I'll try again anytime soon. I'm just not good at freemotion!). I made a pieced binding from leftover fabrics which I think is a really cute look. My binding was double fold style and 2 1/4 inches wide.


The finished quilt is about 35 inches square. I used 3/4 yard of the robot print because of all the fussy cutting and 1/4 to 1/3 yard of 6 different coordinating prints. Please let me know if you have any questions, and I'll revise the tutoral accordingly!

Friday, October 2, 2009

New Projects

I'm excited to say I am beginning my first commissioned quilt! Here are the fabrics I pulled to go with the dust ruffle in the baby's nursery. I think I'll use the lavender and brown print as the backing. My client is giving me a lot of freedom in terms of designs, so right now I'm thinking I might do a circle quilt like this but with a brown background. Do you think that is too much like the dust ruffle?If I wanted to contrast the ruffle pattern I thought of doing simple horizontal stripes with a monogram on the right bottom corner. I like that idea, and so does my client, however I'm not loving the fabrics right next to eachother. I think I like them better separated by brown. Ideas?

While fabric shopping I couldn't resist this Neptune honey bun. Cute! Maybe I'll do a railfence or log cabin with it.

Monday, September 28, 2009

Quilting Bee October Block


Here's the October block for my quilting bee. Wen is making a bento box quilt out of thrifted sheets. She'll cut each of these blocks into four, then shuffle them and sew them back together, like this.

Sunday, September 27, 2009

Piecey Notepad Cover


Can you tell I'm using up all my black and white scraps? Here's my last notepad cover. On to new things now.

Thursday, September 24, 2009

Pieced Pillow Top


At 16 1/2 by 16 1/2, this turned out perfectly for a pillow form - no idea how that happened :). It ended up being a lot of work with 200 triangles, but I like how it's turning out.

Monday, September 21, 2009

First Christmas Gift Done

I've finished my first handmade Christmas gift. I used my own tutorial, so I know it works :). On its own, or pair this up with a key wristlet, tissue cozy and/or checkbook cover, and you've got a great gift!

Friday, September 18, 2009

Quilted Pillow Project - we've just begun

I've seen so many gorgeous quilted pillows on flickr, I just had to start one for myself. Now that I've started it, I'm not sure why I made the triangles so tiny! This is only 10 inches square! I think I want to use a 16 inch pillow form, so I've got more piecing to do.