How I started quilting...and a tutorial

I have tried my hand at various crafts over the years.  I tried crocheting, got part way through a blanket and set it aside and never touched it again.  I scrapbooked for a while-made a 5X7 and 8.5x11 album with pics from when the manchild was little.  I dabbled in stamping and made a few cards(even made Christmas cards one year...amused myself by using Halloween stamps that said 'Best Witches' but all in red/green Christmas colors).  Those too fell by the wayside. 

I decided to give quilting a try-I had a couple of friends in an online Navy Wives group(Brooke and Allison) who mentioned they were doing a class and I was like sure why not.  I thought that since my grandmother and greatgrandmonthers quilted, but I never learned from them, I could at least try to learn their craft.  I didn't even own a sewing machine(which wasn't required for the class, they had some you could use).  I had never even sewn more than a button. I joked that the extent of my sewing history was me sitting in the lid of my grandmother's sewing machine and rocking back and forth, falling over into the China hutch and busting my eyebrow open(I still sport the scar from that-plus two more incidents unrelated to sewing that caused it to bust open again).

We did very basic stuff in class...how to cut with a rotary cutter and the quilting rulers.  Basic block assembly and seam allowances(all seams in quilting are 1/4".....so if you want a block to be 6" when finished, you cut it at 6.5" to allow for the 1/4" seam on the sides).  I did well in math in high school, but didn't love it(it was history that kept me engaged), except for geometry.  Geometry made complete and utter sense to me-there's a reason for everything.  Quilting clicked immediately for me.  It's all basic math.  You want a 12" square, you use 6" pieces joined together....two triangles make a square, etc.   Gloss over that part if math isn't for you and don't let it scare you lol.

In quilting, I found something I loved to do. I could take this pieces of fabric, cut them into various sizes and piece them together to make something nice looking.  I never considered myself artistic, but people tell me otherwise....I guess I can see it.  I take colors and match and coordinate them, I put them into cool designs, etc.  I DO spend a lot of time sometimes agonizing over what goes with what-or trying to find *just* the right colors for things(like the ribbon rack wall hanging I made for the man-he said to me 'you even made sure the orange in the air medal and the NAM were different'-well yeah, cause they ARE different.

Anyway, enough about why I started quilted.  I've had several friends profess an interest, but it can be overwhelming, especially if you look at fancy quilts(NOT mine lol...I consider myself a very BASIC quilter...they're all squares and triangles, nothing more).  Or if you were to see the tools I use...I have 2 sewing machines, an entire closet for fabric, multiple cutting tools(rotary cutters, pinking shears, scissors of various sizes, etc), all the rulers I have(quilting rulers are a special tool, and I DO have a lot of them, but you can go with 1 or 2 basic ones to start with), etc.

Jelly Roll Race quilt top tutorial.

The tutorial I'm going to explain I learned from another online, but it's a video.  I know some people prefer written with pictures they can refer to(several people had said they really liked my cooking tutorials, so I'm going with what has received good feedback.

Here is the video I used on how to make this quilt top-it may answer questions if you have them based on my pictures(feel free to ask me of course, but if I don't get back to you right away, this is another good resource).
Jelly Roll Race video


What you need for this is very basic.
Jelly rolls-a type of precut fabric, they're essentially strips that are the width of fabric(WOF). 
thread
scissors
sewing machine

I used 3 jelly rolls that have 20 strips each...this will get you approx a 60"x72" quilt top

Unroll the fabric strips. I leave them as they are to keep them in the order they're in so I don't have colors bunched together.

Take 2 strips, place one horizontal with the print right side up.  Take the other strip so it meets at the corner(print side down) as shown in the picture.

You need to sew a diagonal seam from the visible top corner to the end corner of the piece underneath-you can pin it if makes it easier to hold the pieces together

The seam will look like this.

Open the fabric so you have a diagonal seam.  Repeat this for as many strips of fabric as you used.

You will wind up with a pile of fabric that is one long continuous strip.

On the back of each piece where you sewed them together and  have an excess of fabric, cut each corner like above.  Repeat for the entire length of the strip.

Find one of the ends of the strip, and cut approximately an 18" piece off as above.  Doing this ensures that there is a variety of fabric lengths overlappaing as you sew them together.

You're going to make the 2 ends meet and lay them on top of the other and sew a 1/4" seam down the entire length of the fabric.  Take a few minutes and make sure the fabric isn't twisted somewhere down the line because if it is, when you get to the end you won't have a flat meeting point, but a twisted mess that you have to unstitch somewhere and resew(ask me how I know this).

When you reach the end, you'll have a folded piece of fabric, sew all the way to the end.

That folded section we just had the end of the strip we just stitched all the way down...cut it so that you can open it up.

This is how your fabric strips should look from opening them up.

Find your two ends again and meet them up and sew all the way down the length again.

You'll get to the end again and have the folded over fabric at the end, stitch all the way through.

And cut you're end piece again.

Open it up again, and now it's 4 strips wide.  You repeat the making the ends meet, sewing down the side, and cutting the end again a couple more times.  There is no exact number to give you-it will depend in part on how many rolls of fabric you used, how you want the quilt to be laid out(some pictures show it with the strips being horizontal when done, mine are vertical).

Hey just just made a quilt top!

This quilt top, from start to finish took me 3ish hours-I watched 2 movies but was done before the 2nd movie ended.  Your time will vary depending on how many jelly rolls you use.  If you use 3 jelly rolls and your quilt comes out looking something like above, you'll need 5 yards of backing fabric.