A Chevron Quilt

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Several months ago, I pinned a chevon quilt on Pinterest with the intent of making it. But as the months past, the idea never came to fruition. That is, until I started to think about what I wanted to make for a friend whose baby is due at the beginning of October. I knew it was a design she would adore, and I am excited to say, it’s a design that is super easy to make.

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The entire quilt is made of these squares. For my quilt that was 36 inches x 40 inches, I used 90 of them.

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The process of making these squares is a trick that  all beginning quilters should learn. Once made, these squares can be arranged in several different patterns, including a pinwheel. The first step is cutting out 7×7-inch squares of both the white and grey fabric.

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Next, I  layer a square of the grey fabric on top of one of the white and sew a border, using a 1/4 inch seam allowance.

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I then cut the square in half, diagonally. I repeat this step with the two triangles I just created.

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To finish, I unfolded the triangles and ironed the seams. I also cut off the extra fabric at the corners. As you can see, one 7-inch square quickly creates 4 smaller squares. Once you get the hang of it, you’ll find you have 90 squares before you know it.

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Once you have made all of the squares, you simple have to sew them together. My quilt was 10 rows of 9 squares each. You arrange the squares so the same colors are always touching.

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Since we’re dealing with squares, it means we’re exclusively dealing with straight lines. So once you create the rows of 9 squares, all you have to do is sew the rows together.

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To accompany the chevon design on the front of the quilt, I used a yard of an adorable elephant pattern for the back that matches perfectly (if I do say so myself).

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Once I basted both sides of the fabric to the polyester batting I purchased, I simply quilted along the chevron pattern.

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For the binding, I chose a green fabric that matches one of the elephants on the back. I cut the fabric into 2.5 inch stripes, sewing them together to have enough to fit the diameter of the quilt. I next ironed down a half inch of one side of the fabric.

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I sewed the binding to the quilt, using a 0.5 inch seam, using my short cut you can read about here for the corners.

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Now that I have made a handful of quilts, I wanted to create a tag that would start to mark them as mine. But for this quilt, I didn’t want to use my initials since I am making the quilt for a friend, so I decided to use the year – the year her baby would be born.

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I couldn’t be more happy with the final result. Of course, the quilt contains a few mistakes (if you look closely, you’ll notice I accidentally purchased two different colors of grey fabric). But with such an easy first-time experience,  I know I will make another chevron quilt in the near future. And coincidentally, when I gave the quilt to my friend, I found out the chevron and the elephants match her nursery perfect. I guess you could just say I am very on top of the current trends!

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