Press all the seams. I’m pressing mine open for this quilt. I think it will make things simpler in the end.
Arrange your squares according to the diagram below.
For this block I sewed things up a little differently in order to keep the edges of my chunks of color perfectly straight, even if my seams weren’t lined up perfectly.
We’re going to sew the whole thing into three fat rwos, but we’re going to sew some parts of those rows into chunks first.
1. Sew up the two orange 3×3 squares and 1 orange 4×4 square.
2. Sew up two aqua 3×7 rectangles and two aqua 3×4 rectangles.
Arrange those chunks as you see below.
Now sew all those chunks into rows.
Finally – sew all those rows into one fabulous block. 🙂
Press all the seams. I’m pressing mine open for this quilt. I think it will make things simpler in the end.
Arrange your squares according to the diagram below.
For this block I sewed things up a little differently – mainly to keep the edges of my yellow squares perfectly straight, even if my seams weren’t lined up perfectly.
We’re going to sew the whole things into columns, but we’re going to sew some parts of those columns into chunks first.
1. Sew up the four all-green columns.
2. Sew the middle two all-green columns together.
3. Sew all the yellow squares into their 3×3 blocks.
4. Sew eight 1×3 green rectangles.
5. Sew four of the 1×3 green rectangles into two 2×3 green rectangles.
Arrange everything as you see below.
Now sew all those chunks into columns.
Finally – sew all those columns into one fabulous block. 🙂
I had to take a bit of a break from the Controlled Chaos while I made my daughter Jo a T-shirt quilt to take to school with her, but I’m back! I’m easing back into things with some simple wide stripes.
Ready to make block #7?
What You’ll Need
60 two-inch squares in color A (shown in blue)
40 two-inch squares in color B (shown in pink)
Instructions
Use 1/4″ seam allowances for all sewing.
Arrange your squares according to the diagram below and sew them together into rows.
Press all the seams. I’m pressing mine open for this quilt. I think it will make things simpler in the end.
Sew the rows together to make the finished block.
Here’s the exploded view. . .
Here’s what my seven blocks look like so far. . .
I’ve decided to make mine a largish lap-sized quilt for me to use on the couch. It’ll be 4 blocks wide and 5 blocks tall for a finished size of 60″ x 75″ – a little smaller than a twin quilt. And I’m going to hand-quilt it!
Everyone knows not to use your good fabric scissors on paper, right?
RIGHT?
Today I thought I’d go beyond that very basic info with some extra detail on how I manage all my scissors – including my fabric scissors. This is going to answer a few questions that I get all the time.
Do you use expensive scissors?
Nope. Don’t get me wrong – I’m a big fan of high quality tools. I KNOW that quality scissors are better than cheap ones. But I also know that I am terrible at things like. . . bringing scissors in to get them professionally sharpened.
Good quality scissors that are painfully dull because I don’t know how to sharpen them myself and I can’t seem to coordinate my life well enough to get them professionally sharpened are worse than cheap scissors.
I can get a decent pair of Fiskars sewing shears at any big box fabric or craft store for under $20 – and then replace them every year. More on that replacement in a bit. . .
Which scissors do you use for cutting fabric and paper together – like with fusible adhesive or freezer paper?
Ah – that brings me to The Great Scissor Rotation.
I keep three pairs of big scissors in my fabric room. (This is only about the big scissors (shears, if you want to get technical) – I also have spring-loaded snips at the sewing machine and an assortment of tiny scissors for precision work.)
My newest pair of scissors is for fabric only.
When I bring in a new pair, the old fabric scissors become the scissors I use for fabric fused to paper.
(Update! I’ve discovered some specialty scissors that I REALLY love for cutting applique pieces, so now I use these for that purpose exclusively, and I leave this step out of my rotation)
The old fabric-fused-to-paper scissors become my paper scissors.
My old paper scissors move into the kitchen for snipping herbs, cutting waffles into dipping strips, cutting open packaging, etc.
And my old kitchen scissors move into the toolbox for real heavy duty work.
The scissors that were in the toolbox are usually totally destroyed by this time and they finally go in the trash.
I buy a new pair of scissors about once a year. While that may seem wasteful at $20 a pair when I could buy a quality pair that will last a lifetime for just under $100 – every pair of scissors I bring in gets used for about five years. Not bad at all! And I never need to coordinate bringing them in to be sharpened. 🙂
I mentioned above that this rotation only applies to basic shears. I do have some other specialty scissors that I love and am very particular about.
By the way – because I know someone is going to ask. I do sharpen my kitchen knives – but sharpening scissors is a different matter, one that I’ve been told repeatedly is best left to professionals. The angle of the sharpening is very different and you need to get both blades to work together. It’s more complicated and beyond my rudimentary knife-sharpening skills.
Here are handy links to all the posts about quilting tools and supplies.
Want to learn how to make a quilt with an easy online workshop – totally free?
Sign up for Let’s Make a Quilt here. You’ll learn how to get started, the tools and supplies you’ll need, and how to make a quilt from start to finish using Quilt As You Go and applique with fusible adhesive.
It’s the easiest, most fun way to make an applique quilt. You can do it!
Applique a pretty butterfly with this free pattern!
Nothing creepy. A ladybug, a bee and a butterfly. Maybe a grasshopper and a worm.
In the end I decided to just make it a wild riot of colorful flowers – bug free.
But I kept thinking about the bugs. The zinnias in my garden and the butterfly bushes in my yard are in full bloom right now and they are covered with swarms of beautiful butterflies.
I realized that I could release a free butterfly pattern, scaled to match the blocks in the Wild Flowers quilt. That way you can substitute one (or more) butterfly blocks for any of the square blocks in the quilt.
Fun!
Of course, you don’t have to make a quilt. You could use this solo block pattern in a pillow, a tote bag, a tablet cover, a wall hanging or more. You could applique it on a finished T-shirt or on a tea towel.
You could also go totally quilt crazy and make a bunch of butterfly blocks in different colors and join them into one joyous, colorful quilt!
Have fun with it!
Want to see a mock up of the butterfly applique pattern mixed in with the flowers from the Wild Flowers pattern?
See it? I tweaked the color a bit in photo editing to make it stand out more, but you’d let it blend in real life. 🙂
This is easy peasy applique. All of the instructions use my favorite applique with fusible adhesive technique (with links to video tutorials, of course) but you could also use needle turn or freezer paper applique.
Materials Needed
For each block you’ll need an 11 inch square of fabric for the background, scraps of fabric for the butterfly and one sheet of fusible adhesive. (I usethis printable product – no tracing!)
If you’re doing Quilt As You Go you’ll also need an 11 inch square of cotton batting.
The image has already been reversed, so just trace or print.
Step 2
Rough cut around each shape.
Leave a little bit extra all the way around - a little extra extra (at least 1/4 inch) where there’s a dotted line - the inside edges of the wings where they’ll tuck under the body.
Step 3
Fuse each pattern piece to the wrong side of the fabric.
Step 4
Cut around each piece.
Cut directly on the solid lines. Leave a little seam allowance on the dotted lines – that’s where the inside edges of the wings will tuck under the main body piece.
Step 5
If you’re doing Quilt As You Go then you can quilt your block before adding the applique. So easy!
Cut your background block and your batting 11 inches square. Layer them together and quilt any pattern you like!
If you’ll do the quilting later, simply skip this step. (That’s what I did for my sample block – so you won’t see a quilted background in the following photos.)
Step 6
Peel off the paper backing and arrange the butterfly pieces on your background block. Tuck the edges of the wings behind the body, and the top wings behind the bottom wings.
Remember - all the dotted lines indicate where pieces tuck behind other pieces.
Fuse the pieces in place, following the package instructions for whatever brand of fusible adhesive you’re using.
Step 7
Stitch around all the pieces. I just did simple straight line stitching in black thread.
I love the cartoony effect.
This post has more information about outlining stitching your applique.
Done!
One free butterfly applique pattern becomes as lovely fabric butterfly block!
If you’re making one-block project, go ahead and finish it up!
If you’re making a bunch of butterfly blocks to join into a quilt - have fun!
It’s finished! Jo’s T-shirt quilt is finished – and just in time.
Whew!
I finished the last bit of the binding at midnight the night before she had to leave for school. It’s a good thing Jo wanted to spend her final night at home watching a Doctor Who marathon (perfect for binding handwork) otherwise I was sure I’d be finishing it in the car on the way. 🙂
Yes – that’s Cuddle Fleece on the back. She’s just crazy about that stuff! She actually asked me to make her a pillowcase out of it the morning before leaving for school. I had to tell her I’d mail it to her. 🙂
The finished quilt fits a twin-size bed with an overhang all around. It’s 72 inches wide and 87 inches long – made up of thirty 15-inch squares.
I know you can’t see all the individual blocks with it wrapped around her, so here it is all flat.
The image is actually a digital mock-up of the finished blocks. I used it to help me decide on the final layout without crawling around on the floor.
The blank gray squares you see are where Jo didn’t have quite enough T-shirts for the size quilt she wanted. I filled those spots in with favorite fabrics she picked from my stash.
I love how it’s a collection of all the things she’s loved/been obsessed with over the last 8 or 9 years. I see a lot of cats in there. . .
. . . some geeky goodness. . .
. . . a reminder of a terrific Dragon*Con panel with the creators of Fraggle Rock. . .
. . . Minecraft and other video games. . .
. . .our trip to Japan. . .
. . . and (of course) Doctor Who.
Quilting was simple. She didn’t want batting – just the Cuddle Fleece backing – so I didn’t have to worry about quilting closely enough to hold the batting in place. I just stitched in the ditch between each block. Here are some videos to help you with the final steps of the project.
Jo’s cleaning out her closet today and she may pull out a couple more that are getting too small. If that doesn’t net us three more I’ll be hitting my fabric stash and just cutting 3 big blocks of fabric she loves for the last few squares.
We had one of her favorite T-shirts that didn’t make it into the quilt. It was just too tall and she didn’t want to lose any of the image – not even a smidgen. So she asked if I could make her a pillow out of it.
Done!
It’s a nice squishy pillow and she loves it!
I used this method to make the pillow – only instead of adding framing all the way around I just added strips to the sides. It’s the same idea though! And I always put a zipper in the back so I can remove the cover and wash it.
Jo LOVES these pillows and uses them instead of bed pillows. In case you’re wondering, it’s Fairfield brand Home Elegance Ultimate Luxury PIllow – it feels exactly like a pricey down pillow but it’s less expensive and machine washable. Win!
That’s right – FREE! And that doesn’t mean it’s some skimpy abbreviated form of one of my regular patterns. You’ll get everything one of my regular quilt patterns normally includes.
Complete instructions – including yardage requirements, cutting instructions, and assembly diagrams – for five different sizes.
Crib (48″ x 61″)
Nap (60″ x 72″)
Twin (66″ x 83″)
Queen (84″ x 94″)
King (108″ x 94″)
Detailed instructions with step-by-step photos showing how to assemble the blocks.
Instructions (and diagrams) for pieced backs for all the quilt sizes.
Links to videos teaching you all the skills you’ll need to complete the project – including basting, quilting and binding.
This is a very easy quilt – easy to cut, easy to sew, and easy to machine quilt. And it’s designed to make efficient use of fat quarters and all your scraps. Wait until you see how this one goes together!
If you like this free pattern, sign up for the Shiny Happy News! Members get a weekly newsletter full of sewing tips and tricks, free patterns, special discounts, and other things to make you smile. 🙂
It’s finished! Jo’s T-shirt quilt is finished – and just in time.
