Whats the First Step When Making Any Quilt?
Preparing your materials is an important first step whenever you are beginning a new quilt. You wouldn't start a brand new job in mucky clothes, so why should your quilt be any different?
To get your quilt off to the best start, I have listed my pre-flight quilting checklist.
Read Any Instrutions
This is the most vital step before anything else, I learned this the hard way - which I'm going to tell you about later on.
The directions will give you warnings about anything that will damage or affect the materials during the preparation process, so take care you read all the instructions so that you don't get caught out.
Washing
When you've read the directions, your next stop is to wash the quilt. The directions will tell you whether its safe to put in the machine or whether you must hand wash it, as well as the temperature of water to use.
I was recently working on a green quilt design and did not go over the directions. As it seems, the actual dye they used for this material doesn't handle warm water very well and the colours ran and faded in areas, so be alert and check!
Drying
Drying is one of the things which surprises a considerable number of quilters. Some material doesn't react well to being put in bright daylight right after washing.
More commonly, there are more materials that will get damaged if you put them into a dryer, so make sure you know what you are dealing with.
Ironing
Like drying, ironing is another step in which you can ruin a supremely good fabric. Materials like silk and polyester will burn or melt if you use an iron that is too hot.
There are too many materials to cover here, so in short if you are uncertain, put your iron on the lowest setting simply to be safe.
When you're ironing, start from the center and push your iron out to the sides. Once the material is flat, run your iron over the sides to remove any little wrinkles and make it prepared for stitching seams.
If you follow these steps, your material will be prepped and ready to be used in any quilt, removing any forseeable issues with the fabric itself.
To get your quilt off to the best start, I have listed my pre-flight quilting checklist.
Read Any Instrutions
This is the most vital step before anything else, I learned this the hard way - which I'm going to tell you about later on.
The directions will give you warnings about anything that will damage or affect the materials during the preparation process, so take care you read all the instructions so that you don't get caught out.
Washing
When you've read the directions, your next stop is to wash the quilt. The directions will tell you whether its safe to put in the machine or whether you must hand wash it, as well as the temperature of water to use.
I was recently working on a green quilt design and did not go over the directions. As it seems, the actual dye they used for this material doesn't handle warm water very well and the colours ran and faded in areas, so be alert and check!
Drying
Drying is one of the things which surprises a considerable number of quilters. Some material doesn't react well to being put in bright daylight right after washing.
More commonly, there are more materials that will get damaged if you put them into a dryer, so make sure you know what you are dealing with.
Ironing
Like drying, ironing is another step in which you can ruin a supremely good fabric. Materials like silk and polyester will burn or melt if you use an iron that is too hot.
There are too many materials to cover here, so in short if you are uncertain, put your iron on the lowest setting simply to be safe.
When you're ironing, start from the center and push your iron out to the sides. Once the material is flat, run your iron over the sides to remove any little wrinkles and make it prepared for stitching seams.
If you follow these steps, your material will be prepped and ready to be used in any quilt, removing any forseeable issues with the fabric itself.
About the Author:
Curious about more green quilt design ideas? Then head on over to Jane Green's how to make a patchwork quilt site now!