How to make an "easy" baby quilt

I just got done with my first baby quilt. It was an "easy" quilt (harder than I thought though), but thanks to a lot of help from my grandma (an expert quilter) I completed it without too much trouble.

Here are the tips I picked up from her.


  1. Pick out fabric you love. Pick out at least 5 different fabrics (you'll need at least 1/2 yard each). They could be coordinating colors, or themed (all fabrics with animals), or fabrics with interesting textures. For your first quilt, I'd recommend staying away from silk, satin or anything with a really loose weave (it's super hard to sew).

   2. Don't forget batting (I like the all natural cotton batting) and a nice soft flannel for the back. Also, you might consider getting binding tape for the edges as well.

   3. Determine your quilt size. You don't have to buy a pattern, you can make an easy one yourself with simple grid paper. Figure out how big your want your quilt to be. A good large baby quilt might be 3'x3' if you want to have an even number of squares on all sides. Just remember, this is for a baby... it doesn't have to be huge. Your pattern should be a scaled down version of your quilt. The easiest pattern is just a simple grid, for example 5 squares across and 5 squares down (with all the squares being the same size).

   4. Label your quilt rows. Starting in the upper right hand corner, label the squares across 1 - 5. For the next row, move the "1" to the end and start with square number "2". So... your rows will look like this: (1st row) 1, 2, 3, 4, 5; (2nd row) 2, 3, 4, 5, 1; (3rd row) 3, 4, 5, 1, 2; (4th row) 4, 5, 1, 2, 3; (5th row) 5, 1, 2, 3, 4.

   5. Label your fabrics with a corresponding number.

   6. Cut your fabric. Now that you've decided how large your quilt is, you can figure out how large your quilt squares will be. For a quilt that's about 3'x3', here's the math: 3'x12" = 36" per side. Let's round up to 40" per side (just to make life easy). That means that each square in its final form will be 8"x8". You need to allow 1/4" on each side to sew so that means that you should cut each piece of fabric into five pieces that are 8.5"x8.5". This cutting takes a while, so be sure to alot enough time here.

   7. Arrange your fabric. Remember those numbers for that fabric? Stack your fabric in five piles. You're going to "coalate" your fabric into a new stacks that correspond to the rows mentioned above in step #4.

   8. Sew fabric together into 5 rows. Take your first two pieces of fabric for row one and sew them together along one side. Sew them together face-to-face so that you won't see the seem when you open it back up. Then sew the second and third pieces together, then the third and forth together and so on. You're ONLY sewing rows at this time. Once you finish the first five squares, put it somewhere so that you can see the pattern that you created and move onto the second row and follow the same pattern. Remember, you're sewing the two fabrics together with a 1/4" on the far side of the seam.

   9. Sew rows together. Keeping in mind which row is which (it's important to keep them in order), sandwich your first and second rows together face-to-face so that if you were to sew them together and open them up, the first row would be above the second.  Continue on, sewing the third row to the second, forth row to the third and so on.

  10. You're done w/ the front!!!!

  11. Cut out the back and batting; it should be the same size as the front.

  12. Pin your layers. Lay out the back, batting and front together like a sandwich. Make sure that the font side of your backing is facing down towards the ground. Pin the quilt together by pinning through all three layers every three to four inches. Start at the top and smooth the quilt as you go so that there aren't any "bubbles".

  13. "Quilt" your quilt together. Starting on one side of the quilt, sew all three layers together, sewing as closely as possible along the seam that you've already created. This is called "stitch in the ditch", and makes sure that your quilt is held securely together. Continue along every row and every column, working methodically across your quilt, removing pins as you go.

  14. Sew the binding onto your quilt. Sometimes this is done by machine, but often times part of this is done by hand. You'll cut the binding into long strips, one per side and sew the binding onto the front of the quilt first, then flip the quilt over and sew it onto the back. You can also get the binding tape that is "sticky" and makes your life a little easier by actually sticking to your fabric while you sew.

  15. Add a label. This can be a label that you buy from the store that you add your name to, or a handmade label that you make out of a piece of fabric and sew to the back. Include your name, the baby's name and birthday (if you know it).

  16. Share with the new baby! There's nothing better than seeing a new baby play on a quilt that you made... so pass it off to that baby and know that they'll have a colorful, soft and love-filled gift for years to come!