Baby quilts - Make it their own!

Appliqué is a very simple technique in quilting which adds some personality to a lovely patchwork! You may want to try this on a sample square, like I did, which you can use again. I quilted one square of blue fabric and appliquéd a red heart onto it for example.

Adding an appliqué letter to your quilt

My niece's name begins with an 'e' so I found a font I like, Cooper black, and blew it up to 560 pt which means the 'e' fits in my 5" square.

I printed out the 'e' as an outline, cut it out (as a pattern), checked it fitted the blue linen square I wanted to put it on and then found some leftover pig pattern fabric from my patchwork (to use for the 'e') so that it would match.

Checking the size of the space

N.B. Think about where your pattern will fall on the letter. To check, hold your fabric and letter pattern together up to the light. I didn't want to cut off the pigs' eyes or anything too much so this helped me to figure out what I wanted.

I then pinned the paper 'e' to my leftover pig pattern fabric and drew around it with a pen. I then took the paper pattern off and cut out the fabric with fabric shears. I placed and pinned my fabric 'e' where I wanted it on my quilt. I decided the bottom right hand corner square would be a nice place for it. 

I put the same colour sewing thread in the sewing machine for the top thread and bobbin thread because sometimes a different colour comes up on certain interesting stitches (like Arrowhead stitch). Using the buttonhole setting on my sewing machine I simply sewed all around the 'e', making sure that I sewed equally between the pig pattern fabric and the blue fabric. This will stop the 'e' from fraying and make the stitch look even.

TIP: You might like to start with simple capital letters in a straighter font as it can be tricky sewing curves. You could also double up on your stitch to make the sewing a bit bolder.  

My pretty 'e'

I'm not sure how other people do it but, in hindsight it might be easier to appliqué onto the patchwork (before sewing the quilt together) so that there are only two pieces of fabric to sew through. But, you don't get the lovely quilty, flumfy effect that you get from quilting the fabric together like I have done. The way I have done it also means that I know the 'e' will be in the middle of the square exactly, no matter what happens with my crazy sewing!

Why not try making an Alphabet quilt?!