Tag Archives: sewing with kids

• 4 Comments

•

My son and I are working on a little scrap sewing project. The first step of our project was to sort through all of my bags of scraps. (My scraps are currently housed by color in gallon zip lock bags.) It's a bit of an "I Spy" project, so we wanted to pull any interesting scraps that had fun pictures on them. In a few cases, we pulled a piece of interesting fabric from my stash, like those awesome giraffes that I haven't used anywhere yet. We're piecing them together in monochromatic blocks which are rounded out with any other scraps in that color. You'll see from these scrap blocks that the majority of my stash (and scraps) are blenders, so most of my fabrics read as one color.

I had previously finished an orange block.

 

In the last couple days my son (age 8) has been itching to sew. He picked out some of the yellow and green scraps, trimmed and created the layout of each block and did all the machine sewing to piece these blocks. I assisted by pressing seams and trimming edges where necessary to have a straight edge to sew.

 

These blocks are each 8 1/2" unfinished. I just love working with scraps from previous projects. The orange butterflies are from an Pretty Ditty Apron I made as a gift last year. One of the orange blenders was from the Midnight Mystery quilt. The yellow alphabet fabric was from the Text Me swap I participated in. A couple of the yellow fabrics were scraps from one of my favorite early projects, Candy Shoppe, and the yellow brick fabric was used on the Wizard of Oz quilt I made for my nephew. My son used that green print on the left edge in the Ocean Quilt he made for my daughter and the turtles are on the back of his first quilt, Jungle of Animals. Scrap projects are full of memories.

• 10 Comments

•

Two years ago I made class quilts with the kindergarteners at school when my son was in kindergarten. Last year another parent took the reigns and and this year it was my turn again, since my daughter is in kindergarten this year.

I decided to do something a little more complicated this year. Since I was really enjoying seeing all the Village quilt blocks on instagram I ordered a copy of the pattern for the kids to each sew a house block. They made fingerprint art a la Ed Emberley on the doorway fabric with their teachers and I led them through piecing their blocks. (The maker's names are on each doorway as well, but they have been removed for the blog post.)

The kids are at a montessori school, so sewing has been part of their curriculum for the last three years. By kindergarten they are all comfortable using needle and thread. To help them with their piecing, I use a frixion pen to mark the 1/4" seam on the wrong side of each fabric to help the kids keep their running stitch in a straight line. I pin together the two layers of fabric to keep them organized. Some kids take tiny microscopic stitches and some take 1/2" long stitches, but it all gets the job done.

Aren't the blocks adorable!? Once each child finished hand piecing their quilt blocks I brought them home to give them a good press, sew them together, and finish the quilts.

I was sure to get a good shot of the quilt sandwich before I added the binding. When I taught the kids about the parts of a quilt they got a kick out of the phrase "quilt sandwich." I told them that the top and bottom fabrics were like the bread and the batting was like the... whatever you like on your sandwich. One student asked nearly every time I saw him if I had added the peanut butter and jelly yet. ;-)

I opted for echo quilting bordering each house and my daughter helped me pick the zen chic blue dot fabric for the binding. These adorable quilts are about 16" x 15". They were finished and hanging on the classroom walls in time for Mother's Day Tea.

 

Just for fun, here I am with the portrait of myself that my daughter drew for the Mother's Day Tea on Friday.

SaveSave

SaveSave

SaveSave

• 8 Comments

•

Summer break from school is approaching. Among other things, this means a little more time for my kids to sew. I was discussing summer sewing plans with Sarah of Berry Barn Designs and she suggested that we co-host a kids round robin. This idea sounded great to me. We’ve gathered a group of nine young quilters from around the United States to participate in our Kids Quilt Round Robin. (We have one team of sisters sewing together, so eight quilts will be made. The round robin will have two groups of four.)

A round robin is a group of people participating to contribute to each other’s quilts, where the entire project is passed around the circle, with each person contributing. In each group of four, the kids will sew one section for their own quilt and one section for each of the other three quilts. When the project returns to them, they will have four completed units to put together a 40” x 40” quilt top.

Officially starting May 1, the kids will each sew their first 20” x 20” block or 10” x 40” row in May. (Of course parent help is allowed!) Then the first of the month in June, July and August their project will be passed to the next person in their group. September 1st the package will return to them so the quilt top can be put together and quilted.

My kids have each decided on the theme for their quilt. My daughter, R, will be making a cat quilt, and she’s chosen a geometric block featuring Tula Pink’s Disco Kitty fabric. She’ll be sending some extra Tula fabric along in case the other kids would like to include it in their blocks. My son, G, has decided on a sports theme for his quilt and is featuring baseball in his first block. He’ll be piecing his first inset circle and using applique in his design.

I’ll be sharing our KQRR sewing each month, and in November we’ve planned a blog hop to show off the finished projects.

If you have a young quilter, we’d love for you to sew along with us at home. Tag Me @sarahmgoer and Sarah @berrybarndesigns on Instagram with your progress shots.

My biggest tip for sewing and quilting with kids is to work in small chunks of time (and to take a break if either of you get frustrated). One block or row a month is a good, slow pace in my opinion. When sewing with my son on his first quilt, sometimes it would just be one or two seams that we’d put together in a sewing session. All those little bits add up!

I look forward to sharing what we create in the round robin and seeing what your young quilters create. Happy sewing!

Save

Save

Save