A quilt for Lachlan - Preamble

I'm making a quilt for Lachlan and have chosen a pattern called 'Spinning Stars'. The quilt I made for my other great nephew, Jacob was called 'Spinning Circles' so a quilt with a similar name seemed appropriate.

Melanie has asked me to provide step by step instructions for making this quilt so as well as my blog I have created a separate blog the detail each step in making Lachlan's quilt.

I sew all of my quilts by hand. This includes any seams down the middle of the backing fabric, boarders, bindings and quilting.

I love the freedom that hand stitching gives. I'm not tied to a sewing machine and can take my sewing anywhere I go. I love relaxing in the evenings and sewing while I watch TV and always take something to sew with me when I go to doctors appointments.

When I was unable to use my hands because of the psoriatic arthritis I used to knot the three layers of my quilts together. I used this method on my Tumbler quilt, the 'Happiness Is' quilt and also my mother and brother Peter's quilts. As my arthritis had improved when I was sewing my Summer quilt I decided to try and quilt using a running stitch. I am now using the running stitch to quilt all my quilts.

There are many different ways of sewing quilts. Some people sew by machine, some hand stitch using a running or back stitch and others use an over' stitch with or without templates. I use cardboard templates for all of my quilts and sew use the over stitch. All of the quilts I have made using templates have been with pattern pieces that have straight edges, for example, squares, rectangles & triangles. However there is is no reason why you couldn't use the same method with curved pattern pieces such as circles.

I learnt to sew using templates sometime around 1978 when I was 16 or 17 years old. I went to a patchwork course where sewing with templates was the method everyone used. The other thing I was taught which I still use to this day is running my thread through a block of wax. The wax strengthens the cotton and also stop it tangling as much.

The first quilt I made was one for Lachlan's father Jonathon using hexagons. I still have the set of a plastic and metal template (two sizes - one for the fabric and one for the cardboard template) that I used for his quilt.

For the cardboard templates I collect greeting cards. I have a big plastic tub full of different sized cards. The cards should not be too thick as it makes it difficult to tack the fabric on to them however they need to be thick enough to hold their shape. You will also need some thicker card to use as a template for cutting the material. You can also use template plastic for your pattern templates. The pattern template for cutting material should be 1 to 1.5 cm bigger than the base pattern template.

I buy my wax blocks from a beekeeper her in Melbourne called 'Redpath's Beekeepers' however you can buy wax in a holder from Spotlight and quilting stores. I find buying the blocks from a beekeeper works out a lot cheaper than buying the ones from craft stores.


I have a collection of quilting books which I love to look through for inspiration for patterns. I find most of my patterns in the magazines. Occasionally I will see a picture of a quilt and buy the pattern but if it's a simple pattern I create the pattern myself from the picture. I did this for Hannah's Raspberries and Lime quilt.












My standard quilting supplies include:

• a block of wax
• Gutermann's quilters cotton - you can sew in white or cream or choose a color to match your fabrics
• plenty of used greeting cards - various sizes
• thick greeting cards or template plastic to cut material to size.
• rulers - I use metal ruler and have a meter long ruler and one smaller ruler
• scissors - one pair to cut card templates
• scissors - one pair to cut material
• pinking shears (optional) - I have found that when using fabric that has a tendency to fray cutting it with pinking shears helps reduce the amount of fraying.
• quilting needles - I use Birch Big eye quilting needles size 10
• Cotton for tacking templates - try and choose a contrasting color to your fabric
• fabric washable marking pen or chalk
• tracing paper
• cutting boards
• plastic thimble disks or any other thimble
• quick unpick

I have three projects on the go at the moment. The 'Blue Willow' quilt which I only need to sewing the final boarder and binding, Lachlan's quilt and my Postcards from Paris quilt.

I'm trying to get as much preparation done for the Postcards from Paris and Lachlan's quilts as possible. As both of these quilts require a lot of preparation before starting I am trying to get both ready to sew while I am recuperating from my foot operation. I don't have an appointment yet, let alone a date for surgery but I am hoping that it will be in the next month or two.

I like to have two quilting projects on the go at once. One will usually be a simple project that I can take out with me or sew without needing to concentrate too much. The other project is usually one that requires me to concentrate more on what I am sewing.

Last week I started the preparation for Lachlan's quilt. I will endeavour to describe each step as I go and photograph what I am doing.