Hello Quilty Friends!
Happy Thursday to you!
Warm temps are here……..finally! Maybe a bit too much too fast, but I’ll take it! The sun is shining, the sky is blue, it’s actually warm in the upper 80s, but there’s a nice breeze to make the heat tolerable. Believe it or not, I’m sitting here in shorts and a t shirt as I write this blog post. Last week, I was wearing a fleece jacket and long pants. Oh, the difference a week can make. I hope you are having some nice weather wherever you are, too.
I thought we’d kick off the gorgeous weather here in my little corner of the world with a fun quilt tutorial.
VRD Jubilee Quilt Tutorial
Let’s make Jubilee today. It’s a super fast and fun fat quarter quilt and it’s a great option when you need a quilt in a hurry. Looks great in just about any fabric. Perfect for summer quilting. Make it in the afternoon and still have time for dinner and s’mores around the campfire in the evening.
Get your digital Jubilee pattern HERE or your print Jubilee pattern HERE
The first thing we need is fabric! YAY FABRIC!
Today I’m using batiks from the Sweet Shoppe collection by our friends at Hoffman Fabrics. Aren’t these fabrics yummy? I can’t wait to see how the quilt turns out!
Of course, we need to do some cutting before we can sew. Let’s get to it.
In the left photo, below, you can see how many layers I’m cutting at once. I find batiks to be great for layering for cutting as the fabric is finer. When I’m cutting thick or slippery fabrics, I only cut one layer at a time.
Let’s get the rest of the fabrics cut. For Jubilee, we only need 2 different shapes, which is one thing that makes this quilt go together so quickly. Wow! That was fast!
Time to start sewing the strips together so we can make strips sets and then we’ll cut the strip sets down into the block size we need.
I like to set all my strips to the left of my machine while I sew. Then I select strips randomly to sew together, making sure I don’t grab 2 of the same strip. We want these strip sets to be as scrappy as possible.
Once I’ve sewed 2 strips together for the required sets, I then go back and add the third strip to all of the sets. I find it more efficient to complete each step for all the pieces at once before moving onto the next step.
Once our strip sets are sewn together, it’s a good idea to press them before we begin cutting out the blocks.
Do you struggle with which way to press your seams on the back of your blocks? Me too. More often than not I end up flipping the seams in the other directions when I go to assemble blocks. Oy vey!
The good news with Jubilee is that it doesn’t matter which way you press your seams because the blocks do not line up and the seam do not cross – another reason why Jubilee is quick as a wink.
Next we need to cut our strippy blocks from our strip sets. I’m layering 3 strip sets on top of each other for cutting. To do this, I line then up on the left edge (or the right edge if you cut from that side), but I stagger them a bit top to bottom so the seams are not sitting right on top of each other because stacked seams make a big lump. It’s not a good idea to attempt to cut through lumpy seams or you might accidentally miscut something.
Awesome applesauce! All of the blocks are pressed, cut, and ready to go. Time to head to my flannel wall to lay them out.
I’m going to put the blocks up, alternating the squares with the pieced blocks. I’m just going to slap the blocks up randomly and then I’ll shuffle them around to distribute both colors and fabrics until I find a layout that pleases me. When you are putting blocks together, what is your process?
Below are 3 photos showing shuffled blocks. Sometimes this step takes longer than actually making the whole quilt top (eye roll here).
Here is my final layout.
Because the blocks don’t line up horizontally, we’re going to sew the blocks into columns and then sew the columns together.
And done! Here is the finished quilt top. Isn’t it pretty? I love that the blocks are large so one can enjoy the beauty of the batik fabrics. It turns into a nice throw at 45″ x 60″, but it would be easy to make the quilt larger by adding a border or additional blocks.
Now I just have to layer, quilt, and bind it.
Looking for info on finishing your quilts? Check out these posts in our Basic Quilting Skills blog series:
Batting, Backing, and Preparing Your Quilt for Quilting
Now I’m off to my sewing machine to work on more quilts. Hope you are too!
See you next week, same time same place —
Sew. Laugh. Repeat.
Always,
Tricia @ VRD
Villa Rosa Quilts 
