Rag Quilt 101

Here is the one of my latest finished rag quilts. It is for my friend S and her charity Catholic Daughters. This one I consider a lap quilt as it is twice the size of the baby ones I make. This one is to be raffled off.

I have been fielding a lot of questions about "how to make rag quilts" so I thought I would post a few links and tell you my super secret tips and techniques - not so secret if you know what I mean. I consider this project perfect for novice sewers like me. I do straight lines really well. I like this website http://www.lovetosew.com/makeragquilt for the basics.

For baby quilts I get a yard of 4 different flannels or cottons. So each baby quilt is a total of 4 yards not including the batting. 100% cotton is what rags the best. Out of each yard of fabric I cut 24 - 6 inch squares for a total of 96 squares. You will need 48 - 4 inch squares of batting. I just use the cheap stuff. A rotary cutter is really helpful but not necessary. You are going to make 48 fabric sandwiches there will be flannel on the bottom, batting in the middle, and flannel on the top. Refer to the love to sew for the rest of the directions. I tend to use a 1/2 inch seam rather than the 1 inch. I also suggest investing in fiskar scissor that are specifically for rag quilting if you plan on doing more than one quilt

These are fairly quick and addicting. JoAnn's is having a terrific sale on flannel this week- $2 a yard and I really stocked up. It was so cheap per yard. I decided to stock up. So I got fabric to make 3 more baby quilts. (2 for girls and 1 boy) IT was too good of a deal to pass up. My friend and I stormed JoAnn's. It was pretty funny how much people were hoarding fabric. My friend and I had a good laugh. People are funny - for godsakes it is just fabric and there is plenty of it.