My hairdresser recently announced she was expecting, such wonderful news (but little distressed to realise that I’ll have to go without her for 6 months!) Of course, as a quilter I immediately guessed she’d need a quilt.. The nursery decoration was based on her favourite children’s book – ‘Guess How Much I Love You’. It’s such a cute story and many of you may recognise the images from the book. Illustrated by Anita Jeram, these have been produced as several fabric ranges which include panels and lots of different patterns.
These are so lovely that as soon as Anya mentioned it, I knew that it just had to be the fabric of choice. Quilters are wonderfully generous people and, knowing that the fabrics were ‘out of print’ so to speak, I put a call out on the Facebook associated group – UKQU Destash asking if anyone wanted to part with some. I had a very kindly reply from a lady saying she had some which she wanted to get rid of and quickly posted it to me.
It was such a treasure trove of these fabrics that I was stunned. The baby’s sex is unknown at this stage so I utilised the greens and yellows from the range rather than the usual pink or blue. (As an aside, I always think it’s interesting that pink was originally considered a ‘boys’ colour but changed over the years to be associated with girls….)
I made a simple squares quilt – 4 1/2” squares, sewed into nine rows of seven squares and finished it with a border of the linear fabric; mitring the corners so the pattern faces inward all the way around. Now came the layering and quilting but what wadding to use?
Vlieseline is a household name and produces wonderfully soft wadding in a range of fabrics. I chose the Crib Size Bamboo Mix (268) which is 50/50 cotton and bamboo. Produced from renewable raw materials, it can be either hand or machine sewn making it ideal for duvets, quilts and light clothing such as jackets and coats.
It was beautiful to quilt, with a ‘body’ which works brilliantly for quilting. You can see how well the wadding puffed against the stitching. I feel this would be a good wadding to partner with a top layer of wool or poly for extensive free motion (which gives that extra pouf that looks so nice).
The comfortable, natural soft handle makes it easy to work with for a wide range of applications and it is suitable for use with most fabrics. Washable at 30° and used with an iron on a cool setting and conforms to OEKO-TEX® 100 Class I, standards.
If you’d like to learn to make your own quilt you can join me at Strictly Quilting HQ, near Monmouth for patchwork lessons in many different techniques.
Vlieseline products are available nationwide from craft, hobby and sewing suppliers, online and in shops. For general product and stockist information visit www.vlieseline.com.
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