This is one of my all-time favorite projects to make. It is easy and fairly quick once you get the hang of it. I am sure there are many tutorials out there showing how to make this quilt, but I thought I would add my version to the mix.
I've had this fabric cut and ready to make into a quilt for over a year now, and haven't had any friends with baby girls to give it to. So I decided just to make it to have on hand and to clear out my fabric box.
1. Cut out flannel squares of various colors. You can make it random or a pattern. I like to make one side with plain fabric and the other side a pattern. For a crib size you will need a couple of yards of your main color, and then 1/4 to 1/2 yards of the pattern depending on how many you use. The squares can be any size. I have done 10 inch, but this quilt I decided to go smaller, these are about 6 inches.
2. Cut your batting in squares one inch smaller than the flannel (leaving a 1/2 margin of extra fabric when put together.) You can use any weight you want for the filling. If you are doing larger squares make the batting 2 inches smaller and sew everything with a 1 inch margin.
3. Make fabric/batting/fabric sandwiches and pin together. At this point you might want to think through your pattern, one side of this square will be the front and the other the back of the quilt. My back is all the dark pink, so I didn't have to plan much yet.
4. Sew each square together by making an X through the center on the diagonal. The first seam goes over the pin...
the second one goes over the first seam. You have to pull the fabric with your hand to avoid puckers.
They should all look like this...
My quilt has 64 squares. With the seam allowance they each end up about a 5 inch square in the quilt.
5. Lay out and pin the squares first by row. Pin the seam allowance UP towards yourself, this will stick up out of the quilt. Make sure you pin the fabric all sticking up on the same side. I have a close up and then the whole row.
6. Sew the row together, one at a time leaving a 1/2 seam allowance.
should look something like this.
7. Lay out all the rows to check if your pattern is correct and if you have all the extra fabric sticking up on the side you want.
8. Now to pin the rows together. First match the seams so the quilted corners will match, then pin in between to secure while you sew. Sew all the rows two by two first.
9. Lay it out again to check the pattern, then sew two pieces together until you have groups of four, then sew those together to finish the 8 rows. If yours has an uneven number of rows your groupings will be different.
10. Sew a 1/2 inch margin around the entire perimeter of the quilt.
11. Now the most time consuming part. Clip all the seams about a 1/2 inch apart (this will fray and look great when washed), be careful not to clip your sewing, or you have to go back and fix it. I had to do that 3 times on this quilt...
Finally, wash and dry a few times to fray all the seams! It gets better and better with more washings!
