Note: This tutorial
by Jen Eskridge, was originally posted online on June 28, 2009,
through her ReannaLily Design website - which is no longer online.
Thank you Jen for giving me permission to post it here!
Jen can now be found through her new website: Pro-Stitcher
Welcome to my Braided Quilt Tutorial. This tutorial is just a “how
I did it” and “this is how it turned out” kind
of tutorial.
The one jelly roll makes a nice lap sized quilt, roughly 50"
square.
Edited to add- It has been pointed out to me
that the math for this tutorial is off a bit, for a standard jelly
roll. The jelly roll I used is from Walmart. (My current wallies
sold fabric.)
I think there might be more strips in their roll or something because
I used the math listed below and I even have pieces left over.
BUT if you are using a traditional 40 strip jelly roll- you’ll
need to divide your 7 x 2.5" strips {there should be 240 of
them} equally in to then start the tutorial.
(8 piles of 30 strips OR maybe 6 piles of 40 strips.)
The following directions
are for the quilt I made, with the roll from Walmart. Here’s
how it shakes down:
I took the plunge and decided to finally cut into my jelly roll
pack. I own 5 packs (well, 4 now) But I’ve been hesitant to
cut into the beautiful strips… ’til today.
I made the quilt by cutting the jelly rolls into 7" lengths.
(2.5" x 7")
I then sorted the strips into 7 piles of 40 pieces each.
Then using one stack of 40 at a time, start sewing in the above
fashion. I grabbed the strips quite randomly, so the quilt has that
absolutely scrappy feel.
Stitch them in the order illustrated above, alternating right and
left sides.
Holding piece 1 in your
left hand, right side up, lay piece 2 on piece one, right side down.
Sew that short seam (where piece one is touching piece two) using
a 1/4" seam allowance.
Open this piece. Next add
piece 3, match right sides, use a 1/4 seam allowance and make sure
piece 3’s short edge is in line with piece 2- as in the picture.
I hope that helps. Your quilts are looking really cool.
Next you have to trim the
long braid.
You’ll trim it twice; the sides and the ends.
First trim off the triangles on the sides.
My strips turned out to be about 8" wide.
(The picture below represents all 40 strips, not just the 10 or
so shown.)
Next you’ll need to square up the top and bottom ends.
(The picture below represents all 40 strips, not just the 10 or
so shown.)
The long strips will not have intersecting seams, so its ok to square
off the ends at “the point where you run out of fabric”.
Does that make sense?
After the 7 wide braided
strips are complete & square, ya just sew them together.
When the quilt top is complete, you will need to go back with your
rotary cutter and trim the top and bottom edges so they are flush
and even with one another.
Go forth and cut into those
jelly rolls!!!
~~~~~
Quilting the Batik Braid Quilt
It took me a while to decide
how I wanted to quilt the Batik Braid quilt.
I ultimately decided to treat each column of the quilt as its own
individual quilting space.
Using a blendable thread on top, pink thread in the bobbin, and
my domestic home-sewing machine, I free motion quilted Spineless
Feathers on each column.
To create the feather: make a half heart shape to the right, then
a half heart shape to the left.
Create each new half heart shape at the “V” of the bottom
or top, depending which direction you are quilting.
The “V” is the key to the Spineless Feather.
You can generally see quilting better from the back. … but
not always.
Now you might find this
strange- I bought the original jelly roll in 2008 or 2009 in a small
town, back when Walmart still carried fabric.
I didn’t buy or save any binding fabric.
The binding was purchased at Joann fabrics in 2015 and matches pretty
darn well.
Way to go batik fabric. Well, played.
