Some novelty fabrics are just too cute to cut up - enter Floral Pets by Mia Charro (read more about Mia here).
It was time to make a few 'cheater quilts" with the cutest dogs and cats ever and coordinating flower borders.
A cheater quilt features fabric designed and printed to look like patchwork or applique. All you have to do is quilt and bind. A cheater quilt can also be a panel or isolated image - the choices are endless. Basically - you don't cut up and sew back together!
I pre-washed the panels (the dog & cat yardage), and they did shrink and slightly skew. I was not fussy and straightened them up as best I could. But this video from Laura Ann Coia of Sew Very Easy has a wonderful tutorial on how to Square up a Quilt Panel.
It was a great time to pretend stitching in the 'ditch' - something I never get to do since I press my seams open.
The same rules apply to cheater quilts - starch, iron and have fun. I loved using a bright Aurifil 50wt. #2220 (light salmon) on all the quilts ( I made 3), and straight stitching lots of grids.
For each quilt I bought 1.25 yards of pet fabric for the inside and 1.5 yards for the border & binding. (Note: when I made these Floral Pets was sold as yardage not panels. Each panel now sold from Hawthorne Supply Co. has 4 rows of rectangles. I have 7 rows in my quilts - so 2 panels should be perfect to make this sized quilt).
The border fabric was cut at 6.75" and then attached. 2 yards of fun bright minky for each quilt and I was good to go!
Tip: Since your binding will come out of the boarder fabric, cut binding first. Play around with some numbers. Estimate how big your quilt will be with a border 'this many inches' - and cut your binding to fit that size. Even if you make a mistake or have to fudge a little on the border - you absolutely will have enough binding.
Note: I really wasnt thinking when I pre-washed that the panel would go wonky. I just didn't want the cute animal faces to be too crinkly when the quilt was finished. Maybe on the next cheater quilt I will not pre-wash ... but since this fabric had a big grid - a little trimming was no big deal.
These were very fun to make and if you leave off the wide border - super easy and approachable for a beginning project. A small cheater quilt is also a great way to make a minky quilt for those of you who are a little hesitant of jumping into that fluffy world of minky!
Materials:
Floral Pets by Mia Charro / Blend Fabrics
Aurifil 50wt. #2220 (light salmon)
Warm & White batting
Size: 50" x 53"
March 2019
First off, love these! You talk about your "focus fabric" around the panel. On the dog quilt is it the same fabric as your border and how wide is your focus fabric?
ReplyDeleteHi Earlene - good question. When I made these quilts the fabric was sold as yardage, not as panels. What I was trying to say is that you can make a cheater quilt using fabric sold officially as a 'panel' with a large picture - or just use cute fabric like floral pets (which I was calling focus fabric).
DeleteHawthorne Supply says each panel is about 5/8 of a yard and includes 4 rows in each panel. Looking at my little quilts - I have 7 rows of rectangles. If you buy 2 panels that would give you 8 rows to work with - more than enough to square up.
The border fabric can be as wide as you like - I bought 1.5 because I wanted to have enough for the binding as well (and my math skills are not that good).
I choose to cut my binding FIRST - and that left me with 6.75" for a border all around that I could also trim. I did have some leftovers which I made into zipper pouches which is in the top of the blog under Zipper Gallery. Hope this helps - contact me if you need any more help :)
Do you have any recommendations for a tutorial of this style? I have never made a quilt but I saw this fabric and then searched for quilts made from it and found your page. I usually sew totes and curtains but would love to make this but I lack the basic know how to bind, etc.
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