Beginner Quilting

What is a quilt?

A quilt is really just two pieces of material sewn together with some kind of batting or stuffing in between to make the finished quilt warmer. There’s no rule that says the top of a quilt has to be pieced or that there has to be a lot of elaborate sewing to hold the pieces of the quilt together. It’s just two layers with something between them.

The most basic beginner’s quilt

It follows, therefore, that you can make a really quick quilt just out of two pieces of fabric. Or even one piece of fabric cut in half.

So here’s a “pattern” for the easiest quilt you can make. You’ll need two yards of two different but harmonious (and the same width) fabrics and a piece of batting the same size. If you don’t have any batting around the house, buy four yards of muslin.

Wash all the fabric together to make sure the colors don’t run and that they shrink evenly, if any shrinkage occurs. Iron as needed. If you’re using muslin for your batting, fold it in half and press so that it is the same shape as your pieces of fabric.

The most difficult part of this quilt is stacking the pieces properly. You’ll want both fabrics to be right side out when you turn the piece (you’ll see in a minute) so stack your fabrics right-sides together (that’s the side that’s printed) and the batting or muslin at the bottom of the pile.

Use your sewing machine to stitch a straight line about a quarter of an inch from the edge of the fabric (the seam allowance doesn’t matter that much, as long as it is even all around). Sew the complete length of three sides and most of the length of the fourth, just like you would do if you were sewing a pillow.

Turn the project inside out through the hole. The printed sides of the fabric should be the front and back of your quilt, while the batting or muslin is all inside. Check to make sure that your stitching has gone through all the layers all the way around, and turn right side in and restitch if necessary. Trim any excess fabric from the seams, turn right side out again and press, making sure the batting or muslin is uniformly flat throughout the quilt.

Then stitch the open part closed by hand, using a thread that matches the fabric and trying to make the stitches as invisible as possible.

At this point you have a quilt. Congratulations. If you want to make your quilt a little more stable, do some topstitching. Using thread that either matches or goes nicely with your fabric, stitch straight lines across the quilt. You can measure and draw or simply sew down the middle in both directions, then sew down the middle of each of those sections and so on.

A slightly more complicated beginner quilt

Using the same technique described above you can make a simple quilt that is a little more complicated in that it actually involves piecing. This time, choose two fabrics (or three, if you want a solid back and a pieced front). Buy two yards each if using two colors, or one yard of each of your top fabrics and two yards of your backing fabric (or two yards of each of the top fabrics and four yards of backing fabric, if you want to make a bigger quilt).

If you have only two fabrics, cut each in half. One half of each fabric will serve as the back of your quilt, just straight sew them together either horizontally or vertically and set aside. If using three, just set aside the third fabric.

Cut the remaining fabric into squares. You can use a template, measure and cut or simply fold the fabric in half and cut, fold in half again and cut and so on until you’re down to squares. This method is not very accurate, especially if your fabric has some stretch. If you don’t mind if all your squares don’t come out exactly the same size, this method works fine.

Once you have a stack of squares in both colors, start sewing them together. Figure out how many squares you need to sew together to make your quilt top the same size as the back (the answer will depend on how small you made your squares).

Then the easiest way to sew them together is to simply alternate colors and sew a strip as long as you need. On the next strip, start with the other color and alternate. Continue in this fashion until you run out of squares. Sew the strips together in the same order you sewed them, making a piece of fabric the same size and shape as your backing material.

It’s easy to obsess over making sure every last square lines up perfectly with the next one. But quilting perfection takes a lot of precision and practice. You won’t get it on your first attempt. And that’s OK. Not everything has to look perfect. It is perfect because you made it.

Finish the quilt as outlined above, again using either batting or muslin as your interior material. Top stitching is even easier this time because you have lines to follow. Keep the lines straight even when your fabric is not.

Variations on the beginner’s quilt

This little quilt is the perfect size for a baby, but there are a ton of different ways to make this quilt. Make it bigger for a teenager or adult, or smaller for a doll house or doll’s cradle.

Add different fabrics. Use four or five different kinds of fabrics, buying a half yard or so of each. Stitch the squares in a pattern or use them randomly. Or don’t even make squares, just cut long strips and sew them together.

Or collect scraps from someone who has been quilting or sewing for a long time. You can also find cheap bits of fabric in your fabric store’s remnants section, or buy what are known as fat quarters, collections of quarter-yards of fabric. Make a bunch of squares that are all the same size and sew together as outlined above.

You can also piece the back of your quilt, either by sewing two pieces of fabric together as described above, taking two different fabrics, cutting them into quarters and sewing back together, or just by making another fully pieced fabric just like the top. This can make the piece extra-bulky a hard to tops stitch, but if you have a high quality machine you can do it.

The point is there are no rules to quilting. Do what feels good, have fun and stay warm!

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