3 - 2 - 1 - Blast Off!

This is such a fun quilt that I get to share with you today! And it's featured over on the Riley Blake Designs blog too!

It started with a bundle of the Blast Off fabrics designed by Shawn Wallace for Riley Blake Designs. They're FLANNEL! And of course with three boys, anything space related is an instant hit, so I knew I HAD to make a quilt with them!

This was such a quick and easy quilt, and I'm going to walk you through exactly how I made it!

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I started with the panel from the Blast Off collection (it's flannel too!) and 1/4 yard cuts of each fabric in the collection. I cut those down to be 4" x width of fabric strips.

To make the quilt, I laid out the panel on the floor, right side down, and smoothed out the wrinkles with my hands.

Then I laid a piece of batting on top of the panel, smoothing out any wrinkles. I made sure this was a few inches larger than the panel on every side. I used Warm & Natural batting, as I had a scrap leftover from another quilt that was the perfect size! (Note: It's important that you do not use polyester or wool batting for a quilt like this, as you can not press those battings. Cotton is best here!) I pinned these two layers together with just a few pins (maybe one every 12" apart or so) to keep it together while I was sewing.

Next, I laid one of the fabric strips on top of the batting, at the bottom of the quilt, right side up. I took my time to line up this first strip, peeking under the batting, to make sure it was straight with the bottom of the panel on the other side of the batting. I centered the strip from left to right, and there were a couple extra inches of fabric on each side. Once I was sure this first strip was lined up with the edge of the panel, I pinned it in place (about four pins total) so it wouldn't shift in the next step. (The photo below shows this process, just on a later strip instead of the first one.)

I chose another 4" x width of fabric strip and placed it right sides down on top of the previous strip. This time, aligning the top edges of the two strips. Again, I put just a few pins through this strip to hold it to the other layers.

Then with my walking foot on my sewing machine, I sewed along that top edge of the strips. I used the edge of my walking foot as my seam allowance guide, which meant it was slightly larger than a 1/4" seam. I rolled the extra batting and backing fabrics on either side of where I needed to sew so that the rest of the quilt was out of my way as I sewed.

I had a wee helper for this step! My *almost* four-year-old (he turns four next week!) pressed the foot pedal of my machine for all the rows! His favorite part is pushing the "scissors button" to cut the threads when we're done sewing. (I sew on a Juki TL-2010Q machine.)

Then I removed the pins in the top strip and flipped it up to reveal the right side. I had a helper to smooth out the fabric too!

This is a good time to press the fabric so it folds up nicely. The flannel actually held really well to the batting, so I didn't press mine. I removed the pins in the backing and batting layers as I reached them when adding a new strip.

Then I just repeated the steps to add another strip! I continued adding strips until I reached the top of the panel on the other side.

Then I flipped the quilt over to the panel side and trimmed along the edges to prepare the quilt for binding.

Of course I used the rainbow stripe fabric for binding!! Check out that pattern matching in the seam too! I even remembered to sew one of my satin quilt labels into the binding!

The result is a two-sided quilt!

One side is made of all the strips of fabric that we sewed together using a quilt-as-you-go method.

And the other side is a really fun quilt panel!

I used a very light blue Aurifil 50wt thread for this quilt. You can see how the panel and batting are quilted in horizontal stitching lines. 

But those lines were the same ones used to piece the other side!

This quilt was also a first for me - I didn't use my iron a single time when making the quilt! Not once! The flannel fabric didn't need pressed before cutting, it didn't need pressed while sewing, and I decided to try sewing the binding on without pressing it first too. And it worked! Call the quilt police!!

This is such a great pattern idea for making a quick and easy quilt! And it shows off all the prints in a collection without cutting them into tiny pieces too!

Even with my youngest son's help, this whole quilt only took about two hours to make!

And he has already claimed it since he helped make it! It's SO soft and cuddly! I'd claim it too!

Have you ever made a two-sided quilt? Or have you ever made a quilt without using an iron?? Let me know if you try it!

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