Great Tips For A Quilt Baby Blanket Gift
Shirts would lose sleeves, front tabs and buttons; skirts, dresses and jeans would lose waistbands, pockets and zippers BUT you must save the buttons and zippers for another clothing project.
The hardest decision is in choosing your colors and materials. Remember to always use complementary ccolors in a selected tone of pastels, dusties, or jewel tones. Strive for a pleasing mix of textures, patterns, and solids. As you sew make sure the pieces complement each other in color and fabric type. Above all, remember to never put pattern against pattern to make sure your beautiful embroidery stitches will show up! Always bounce a solid fabric against a patterned fabric.
If you're not sure what design you should use, take a trip down to the closest fabric store and take a look at their collection of baby quilt patterns. If it is your first attempt at quilting, remember to keep it simple. A lot of the time less is more. This may mean something like the sky with some white clouds. Many people decide on a patchwork design even for baby quilt patterns. Pink and blue are always appropriate colors for babies so you really can't go wrong with that. If you don't know the baby's gender, than white or yellow is a safe, neutral choice.
Blanket Quilt Always wash your handmade quilt in warm or cold water using the delicate cycle on your washing machine. The individual blocks may be made up of slightly different fabrics which will shrink differently. Also, the vibrant colors may fade over time from hot water.
Never dry on high heat. Use low temperature to start the drying process then remove it from the dryer and lay it flat to finish drying. Once it is nearly dry, you can put it back in the dryer on low or air for a short time to fluff it up and finish drying.
After the quilt has been stitched from one side to the other, it is now time to take it out of the frame and see what a masterpiece of fashion that you have created. But you are not done with this project yet, you have to attach a binding around the edge to finish the quilt and before you can start enjoying the warmth of this one of a kind blanket you have created.
The preferred needle type for woven cotton fabrics is called a "sharp." Sizes 75/11 and 80/12 are good choices for piecing, quiltmaking, and binding most simple quilt patterns. Use a smaller needle (70/10) if you're piecing tightly woven batiks and a larger needle (90/14) for flannels. Dull needles can cause skipping or uneven stitches, so it's a good idea to insert a fresh needle at the start of every project.
