How to make the aloha shirt block

The other day Marietta left a comment on an old blog post that I had written about my  marathon of making baby quilts for my dear friend Zuki's grandchildren.  Actually, she has been so blessed with grandchildren that I had to do another marathon last summer to catch up.

All of the quilts consist of blocks made by my friend's grandmother, mostly from scraps that her sewing pal brought home from the aloha shirt and muu-muu factory in Hawaii.  And all of the blocks use the same pattern.  I don't know the name of the pattern, and it's tricky to sew because of lots of bias edges, but apparently Zuki's grandma loved it.  She made hundreds of these blocks, in two different sizes, and with a wide variety of tropical prints and some solids.  Here's one of the baby quilts:

Marietta commented: "I am trying to figure out from the photos how you made the block.  It looks like the second triangle added tucks under the first one."

Marietta, you're right, it's not obvious how to put this block together.  It requires a technique called a partial seam, where you start sewing two pieces together but stop before you get to the end.  You come back later to finish the seam after other pieces have been sewed in.  Here's the step-by-step:

Here's the partial seam, at the very beginning of the block.  Arrange the blue piece in place against the yellow center square, but don't stitch all the way.  Press the first inch or two of the seam so you have a nice neat join before you add the next piece.

Sew on the green piece, and press that seam.  Then sew on the pink, and press again.

Now add the lime green piece and press.  Finally, turn down the last flap of the blue and sew the rest of that seam to finish the block.

If you're thinking that's a whole lot of pressing, and wouldn't it be easier to just finger-press and wait till the whole block is done to hit it with the iron, here's some advice: the more you press the better your quilts will look.  I try never to add a new piece until the seam underneath has been properly pressed, with an iron.

If you're still thinking that's a whole lot of pressing, I suggest three possible approaches to make it easier:

1.  Set up a pressing station near your sewing machine so you don't have to get up from your seat.  (I do this whenever I'm making complicated piecing, no matter what the pattern.  I only get up when the sewed-together portion gets bigger than my pressing area and needs to be spread out on the work table for pressing.)

2.  Make a whole set of blocks at once, adding the blue piece to all of them and then pressing all of them on one trip to the ironing board.  This approach is particularly helpful on a tricky block like this one, where it takes a bit of thinking to make sure you've gotten started right.  Having figured out that first seam correctly, make them all before you forget how you did it!

3.  Regard pressing as an exercise program, so every time you get up and walk to the ironing board you're getting in your steps.  Tedious, but you can feel self-righteous about it.

 

Want to learn magic cross stitch?

I like to teach a process that I call "magic cross stitch," not so much a stitch as a way of approaching a hand-stitching project to incorporate spontaneity, serendipity and surprise.  It's listed on my "workshops" page, and this fall I got an inquiry from a quilt guild as to whether I could do it as a virtual workshop during pandemic lockdown.  I declined, since the process requires a lot of individual hands-on help, and people would probably be disappointed at trying to learn it online.

BUT -- in further discussion with the person who made the inquiry, I decided to write a detailed tutorial on how to do magic cross stitch, then offer individual consultation by email or phone if she had questions or wanted feedback.  And it seems to be working -- she has already made a good start on her project and the last time we emailed, she says she's ready to really get on it in the new year.  

One of the things I am most proud of in this tutorial is that it comes in two versions -- right-hand and left-hand.  The direction of stitching is vitally important in getting good results, and in avoiding wrist agony.  Thus in workshops I spend a lot of time giving directions twice.

But now lefties can read their own instructions and see illustrations of actual left-handed stitching, instead of being the by-the-way afterthought to the "standard" instructions.  

for lefties                                            for righties

The tutorial shows you how to make the "magic" stitch -- by working from the back of the fabric.  This gives you cross stitches, just like the ones you may have learned from your grandmother, but with a whole different mindset. I explain it in the text:  

How can you use this wonderful basic stitch to do original compositions without the stiffness of perfectly arranged rows and columns of Xs?  My method allows you to make stitching that looks lush and painterly, dramatic, textures, spontaneous and improvisational.  It involves no graph paper, no sketching in advance, no counting, no worries about the exact size or shape or placement of your stitches.

If you can thread a needle you can do magic cross stitch.  In fact, if you're a beginner at hand stitching, or if you've long since forgotten the fine points of what your grandmother taught you, you may even be better at this technique than people who have done a lot of cross stitch using more structured designs. 

I like to add french knots toward the end of a magic cross stitch project, so there's lots of instruction on how to master that stitch, too.

But the tutorial doesn't stop when you have learned how to make the stitches -- it helps you plan your color palette, your composition, your placement of colors and accents.  And it guides you through the different methods of finishing your work so it can be displayed on the wall or used functionally.

If you're thinking that you need a nice handwork project to get you through the last grim months of pandemic isolation, this might just be your thing!  Send me an email at < artwithaneedle@gmail.com > and I'll get you a PDF of the tutorial.  Pay $25 for the tutorial, and $50 an hour for subsequent consultation and mentoring if you want it.

Baby quilts: another tutorial

I've always loved putting babies' names on their quilts, among other reasons because it signals to the child that it's HER quilt and she can do WHATEVER SHE WANTS with it.  I have a bunch of different methods to call on, but my favorite is pieced letters.  They're easy to do when the child is named Vivian or Matthew, maybe even Elijah, but difficult for Cassandra, Robert or Quincy.

Or Isaac.  But I wanted to make Isaac's quilt with piecing, notwithstanding the curvy letters.  I bribed myself to do a good job by turning the task into a tutorial, which made me be careful.

This method sort of uses a template, although it's not the kind of fussy construction that you might associate with that word.  It starts with a paper cutout of the letter (of course, you can use this method for any kind of curved piecing, not just letters).  I drew the curve of the C quite shallow to make the piecing easier.

Start by placing the template over the red fabric and cutting along the edges -- eyeball about a quarter-inch away from the edge of the shape to give yourself a seam allowance.  This doesn't have to be precise but do go slow and easy as you cut.  If the cutter pushes a bubble of fabric ahead of the blade and the fabric slinks away from you, lift the blade and set it down again, making sure the template stays in position.

Place the letter on top of the background fabric, and put the template on top.  You want to transfer the curve to the background fabric so you can cut it properly, and you also want to mark the curve on the letter to make it easier to match and sew.  But how do you mark a line on two layers of fabric?

The answer is to use a dull edge to firmly press the line.  Many different tools will accomplish this, such as a rotary marker (like a rotary cutter with a smooth non-cutting edge), the back of a knife, a knitting needle, the pointed end of a pen or paintbrush, or a plastic hera tool.

Whatever tool you choose, test it out on two layers of fabric and various working surfaces to see how hard to press and how well the line shows up.  Remember, it only has to last for a few minutes as you work.  A good light helps you see the mark.

It's always easier when piecing concentric curves to start at the "center" and proceed outward, so that means the first seam will be the one on the right.  Do one seam at a time and press it before you proceed to the next one. 

Use your tool to trace the right-hand curve of the C from the paper to both layers of fabric.  Make several crosshatch marks to help match the curves when you pin and sew.

You've already cut the seam allowance on the letter, so lift it off.  Cut the seam allowance on the background fabric.  Again, no need to be obsessive, just eyeball about a quarter inch.  If you must, err toward a narrower seam allowance rather than a wider one.

Pin the two pieces together at the hash marks, hold the letter on top and stitch slowly to join the two pieces.  (When you join curves, it helps to label them in your mind as "hill" and "valley."  For this seam, the background is the hill and the letter is the valley.  You should always try to stitch curved pieces together with the valley on top of the hill.  It's a lousy mnemonic, but a good sewing practice.  If you can come up with a better mnemonic, go for it -- and let me know so I can change my teaching vocabulary.)

Press the seam toward the valley.  Place the newly sewn segment  on top of the other side of the background fabric, making sure that you have enough underlap for the seam allowance.  Put the template back on top of the letter, matching up the right edge with your new seam.  I like to mark the top with pins on both sides so the left-hand piece of background fabric doesn't get turned upside-down -- a particular concern with woven plaids like this one, where there's no clear right side of the fabric.

Again, use your dull-edge tool to trace the stitching line through both layers of fabric, lift the template and make hash marks across the seam.

Cut your seam allowance.

As you did before, press the seam toward the valley.

P.S.  I used the same method to piece the S on Isaac's quilt, but the curve is much trickier to sew when it changes direction halfway through.  I had to do some ripping and restitching to make it lie flat, and also had to change direction as I pressed.  After I had struggled for a while it occurred to me that I could probably have hand-sewn the seam a lot quicker, but I soldiered through.  It looks pretty messy from the back, but fortunately nobody will ever see that again.  I don't like piecing curves that change direction, especially with only a two-inch radius, but I do love Isaac enough to grit my teeth and do it just this once.

Tutorial: diagonal rail fence

Here's how to make diagonal rail fence blocks, like those in Isaac's quilt that I showed you last week, with zero waste.  I think this method is especially nice for plaids, but if you don't have a lot of plaid in your stash, try out other fabric palettes.  Basically you stack up a pile of blocks, cut through them all in one diagonal line, then switch the order so when you sew them together you get two-tone blocks.  Like this:

Make a diagonal cut through the whole stack.  Take the top piece from one of the piles and put it on the bottom.  Now sew the pairs together in their new order.

You get three new blocks, all different.

Depending on how close to the top edge you made your first cut, and how skinny you want your rails to be, you may have room for as many as three or four more cuts.  Or you may want to quit after one more cut, giving you three rails in the block.

You always do just one cut at a time, swap the pieces and sew the new pairs back together.  That way you can't lose your place or sew the wrong pieces together.

After you cut, always make sure you take the top piece from one of the piles and put it on the bottom so the new pairs will join different fabrics.

This is the basic recipe for making three blocks.  If you want four blocks, start with four pieces of fabric.  Five pieces of fabric will give you five blocks.  This rule holds true no matter how many cuts you make in the blocks.

If you want nine blocks in your quilt, you can make three sets of three, or a set of four plus a set of five.  You can even rearrange the piles in midstream.  For instance, make one cut in a set of four blocks, and one cut in a set of five blocks.  Sew them back together.  Now take two blocks from one set and swap them out for two blocks from the other set.  Stack the blocks and proceed with your next cut.  If you like math puzzles, you can write algorithms for complicated mix-and-match procedures that will give you many no-two-alike blocks.

Three pieces of advice:
1.  Never ever switch the direction of the diagonal cuts in the same block.  If you make some cuts slope up and others slope down, the blocks will look really crappy.  Ask me how I know.

2.  If you use woven plaids, like those in the two quilts I showed you, there's no obvious right or wrong side of the fabric.  So it's very easy to lose track of which side should be up.  That results in a block where the seam slopes up instead of down, or if you're really not paying attention, a block where some of the seams face up and others face down.  Ask me how I know.  I suggest you put a pin in the right side, or use any other method that helps you keep track of which way is up.

3.  If you want to make the up-and-down mountain effect of the three quilts I showed you last week, you will need to make half of the blocks slope up and the other half slope down.  I strongly suggest you make all the ups first and get them on the design wall.  Then make all of the downs.  Make sure you use some of the same fabrics in each set, otherwise it will probably look weird to have all the up blocks predominantly blue or the brightest fabric show up only in the down blocks.  If this sounds too complicated, then forget about the mountain effect and just have all your blocks slope in the same direction.  The quilt will look just as nice.

Important:  Each time you make a new cut, the seam eats up a half inch of height.  So if you're planning to make blocks with just two rails (one seam), add a half inch to the blocks you cut in the first place.  If you want seven-inch blocks, cut 7 inches wide and 7 1/2 inches tall.  Or better yet, cut 7 1/4 inches wide and 7 3/4 inches tall just to give yourself some wiggle room in case the seams run a little bit wide.  You can cut the block down to size after it's all sewed and pressed.

Cutting dimensions
- always add 1/4 inch width to trimmed block dimension
- always add 1/4 inch height PLUS:
   - for one seam (two rails) -- add 1/2 inch height
   - for two seams (three rails) -- add 1 inch height
   - for three seams (four rails) -- add 1 1/2 inch height
   - for four seams (five rails) -- add 2 inches height

Happy sewing!  Let me know how it works out for you.

Quiltmaking 101 -- pressing curved seams

Just as sewing curved seams is a bit trickier than straight seams, pressing is also a bit more worrisome.  But with any kind of seam, you should get into the habit of pressing as a two-step process.  First press lightly from the back side, then turn the work over, check that the seam is good from the front, and only then press enthusiastically.  You want to find and fix any problems before you set them in with lots of pressure and moisture.



If you have sewed parallel freehand strips into a larger module, as in the block above, wait until you have them all stitched before you press anything.  Then sweep your iron across the entire set, pressing all the seams in the same direction in one swoop.  Fabric has a lot of forgiveness and will usually ease itself together nicely even if the edges aren't mathematically exact.  But it seems to lose a bit of flexibility every time it's pressed, so the first time is always the best.  If you have to return to a finished module and add more curved strips, spritz your existing seams well with water before you press in the new seams.

With more pronounced curves it is important to press the seam allowances toward the outside edge.  It's easier to get fabric to spread out under the iron than to get it to squeeze in and still stay flat.

When you press toward the outside, the dark fabric gets to keep its exact original shape; the seam allowance on the lighter fabric has to spread out a bit on the edge to lie flat.  Not a problem; fabric is usually willing to stretch.

When you press toward the inside, the dark fabric gets to keep its exact original shape and things look good from the back.  But underneath, the lighter fabric has to squeeze in to make the extra fabric fit.  

Sometimes this will work out just fine, but sometimes, especially with very tight curves, the underneath fabric can't squeeze in enough and instead it forms pleats.  A problem. 

No matter which way you press, you may come up with the occasional extreme situation where there seems to be just too much or too little fabric in the seam allowance.  If you have sewn garments in a past life, you may be tempted to get out your scissors and cut notches in the seam allowances to make them lie flat, just as you would do at the underarm of a set-in sleeve or at the curved edge of a patch pocket.  Please overcome that temptation!

Instead, try pressing first with plenty of moisture and see if you can encourage the fabric to stretch out and lie flat.  If it still resists, you can get your scissors, but instead of cutting slits in toward the seamline, cut around the edge parallel to the seam to reduce the width of the seam allowance and see if that works.  You can safely cut to within an eighth-inch of the seamline on a quilt that's intended for the wall; stick with a quarter-inch if you plan to use and wash the quilt.  If all else fails, it's better to make several slits that stop at least an eighth-inch shy of the seamline than to make a few that go all the way in.

One last word about pressing: we all were brought up to think that pressing occurs on the ironing board.  But quilters would be better off using the ironing board for fabric storage, as I do, and making another surface to actually iron on.  That's because it's important to have your entire piece lie flat as you press.

As soon as your piecing outgrows your ironing board, you're only able to get part of it to lie flat, and then you have to shift it around.  What frequently happens is that each segment is indeed flat, but the whole thing isn't -- just as you are able to press a garment in flat segments, even though the whole dress curves to fit your body.

So make yourself an ironing surface on your work table or a countertop or even on the floor.  You don't need fancy metallic ironing-board cloth; an old mattress pad, wool blanket or two thicknesses of a towel will do very nicely.

Quiltmaking 101 -- freehand and curved seams 3

If you want to sew S-curves or even more complicated curves, you probably need more precision than you can get from the just-sew-it approach described in the last blog post.  Instead you need to establish a seamline and cut seam allowances on either side.

You don't need to go all quilt-police-traditional and make templates to accomplish this, but you do need a way to make a copy of the curve that will become your seamline.  Why not do templates?  Because you would lose the spontaneity of the freehand curve and change the character of your improvisational composition, and also because exact templates are so fiddly and time-consuming.

Instead, here are two methods of making your curves fit together perfectly while keeping the freedom of the immediate free-cut line.  I call them semi-templates.  You don't need to cut templates to accomplish this, but you do need some way to "remember" your curve so you can add seam allowances as you cut.

The first method uses a template, but it's a free-cut template with a minimum of tedious fuss.  Start with some pattern material that's big enough to draw your entire curve, and a cutting mat big enough to let you do it with one swoop of the rotary cutter.  The pattern material can be freezer paper, newspaper, interfacing or tissue paper.  Lay it out on your cutting board.  Take your rotary cutter and slice a gorgeous curve through the pattern.  If you want, you can stop there, or you can cut more curves as long as they don't cross any of your previous cuts.

(In the photos below I've made four cuts, the start of a large "striped" panel that can keep on going as long as I want. After these pieces are sewed together, I'll have to retrieve the template paper with the curved edge of 5, then make more cuts for more pieces.)

Don’t separate the two halves of the cut yet – first take a pencil and mark across both pieces every six inches or so, and/or at critical points on the curve. And mark across both pieces at the exact top and bottom of the curve.

Pick up one piece of the pattern and lay it on your fabric, making sure you keep track of whether this is going to be the right-hand piece or the left-hand piece. Now visualize how wide you want your seam allowance to be, and free-hand cut that distance away from the template.

It doesn’t have to be a perfect quarter-inch – no need to fuss with rulers, just eyeball it. There’s enough give in the fabric that you will not have problems. Finally, pin the two pieces together at the marked points, and sew. The seam will press perfectly flat.






















Look at that beautiful curved seam!  Now put template #1 aside, get templates #2 and #3 and repeat the process for the next curve.

Place template #2 right up against the seam, and cut along its left edge, adding the seam allowance by eye.  In this photo template #3 is waiting, but I will actually cut it from a third piece of fabric, not maroon.

Note that I do not suggest you cut out all the pieces at once.  It's way too easy to lose your place and try to sew the wrong pieces together (ask me how I know).  Instead cut two pieces (one curve), sew and press, then move on.

With this method you can make curve after curve, as in this quilt of mine.  With some practice you can use this method to make winding-road seams with multiple changes of direction, as long as you mark and pin the seams carefully.

A variation of this method uses a marking wheel to draw your curved seamline directly onto the two layers of fabric, thus eliminating the template.  If you're not familiar with this tool, it's like a rotary cutter except its "blade" is dull, not sharp.

Instead of using the rotary cutter to make your curve, you use the marking wheel, which works exactly like the rotary cutter, with the same arm motion that gives you those nice, loose, artistic swoopy lines.

Layer two pieces of fabric where you want the curve to go, giving yourself plenty of fabric underneath (you don't want your curve to run off the edge of the bottom layer).  Limber up your arm and make a swoopy curve, pressing hard enough to crease both layers of fabric.

The creased lines don't show up all that well in the photos but they do in real life, at least long enough for you to cut and sew as needed.

Now separate the two layers, noting carefully which direction you need to extend for seam allowances. Switch to a rotary cutter and by eye, follow your creased curve a quarter-inch away.

As you did with the paper templates in the first method, put one or two marks across the seams and pin them so you match the curves before stitching.  The more complicated the curve, the more places you should mark and pin.

In the next post I'm going to tell you to press your seam allowances toward the outside of a curve.  That's great with a C-curve, but how about an S-curve?  The "outside" may be toward the left as you start, but then the curve changes direction and "outside" is toward the right.  I can't give you a hard-and-fast rule for these situations.  If one leg of the curve is more gentle than the other, press that one toward the "inside" so it will become the "outside" when the going gets tough.  If all else fails, flip the direction of the seam where the curve changes direction.  Use your best judgment, and plenty of moisture and elbow grease at the ironing board.

Quiltmaking 101 -- freehand and curved seams 2

If you have chosen to cut your quilt pieces freehand instead of using a ruler, or if you are deliberately using curved seams, you face a construction issue: how to make the finished seams lie perfectly flat.  If the curves are gentle -- think the profile of a watermelon -- and if they curve in the same direction, you can usually just sew one to the other and they will be fine.

This approach works as a new construction method if you layer two pieces of fabric on top of one another, then cut a gentle curve through both layers.  Swap the pieces and stitch them together.

The piece above was made with three cuts, not one, and of course it yielded a mirror image piece with the same curves but the opposite color arrangement.  Note that the middle seam ended up wonky, with the black quite a bit longer than the orange, even though they were presumably the same length to start with.  This is not a failure of sewing skill; it's an unavoidable and unpredictable result of the process of sewing two bias edges together.

When this happens to you, and it will, don't feel guilty, don't try to rip the seam and redo it, just trim off the edge.

The just-sew-it approach also works with random pieces that you may find in your stash and want to sew together.  As long as the curves have approximately the same radius, and point in the same direction, you'll probably be fine.  But if they point in opposite directions, or are too radically different in profile, you'll end up with bulges or clots.  Plan ahead, and don't do that.

These pieces will most likely go together beautifully.  

These pieces won't.

With gentle curves the actual sewing will be very much like holding straight edges together -- no big deal.  But when you sew more pronounced curves -- as the watermelon profile becomes more like a cantaloupe or a grapefruit -- it's harder to maintain the proper seam allowance because the two edges are so different in profile: one a distinct hill and the other a valley.  It will be easier if you hold the "valley" curve on top and the "hill" on the bottom, even though that makes a lousy mnemonic.

Establish the seam allowance at one end of the seam and put your needle down through both layers.  If possible, set your machine so it automatically stops with the needle down, to make sure the pieces don't slip out of alignment when you stop to reposition the fabrics.  Carefully align the edges of the two layers and stitch for maybe a half inch.  Stop needle down, and reposition the fabric.

Make sure you can see the edge of the under layer, because it curves away from the needle and if you're not careful you can sew right off its edge.  If you stitch with a hint of pink peeking out from under the yellow, you'll be fine.  Yes, this is slow going, but this is how you get a perfect seam.

The top layer will form ruffles behind the needle as you stitch around the curve.  Don't pull tight on the top layer as you hold it in position; if anything, ease just a bit of extra fabric into the curve as you sew.

After you get to the end of the seam, flip it over and check whether you have inadvertently sewed any pleats into the bottom layer of fabric that you couldn't see.  If you have, get your seam ripper and open the seam for a quarter inch on each side of the pleat.  This time sew with the "hill" side up so you can watch carefully as you ease the fabric under the needle and get it smooth this time.  It's important to fix any glitches before you press, while the fabric is at its most flexible.

Sometimes you'll sew curved edges together, press the seam, and it looks as though everything is perfect.  But when you flip back to the right side, you'll notice that the two edges didn't match perfectly. When you turn that curved seam over, run your fingernail along it from the downhill side to find any hidden pleats.

If you find one, don't worry -- it's very easily fixed.  Turn it back to the wrong side and notice that the iron has creased the fabric at exactly the right place to give you your perfect seamline.  Restitch the seam along the crease mark and the curve will look exactly as it did before, except the new stitching will have closed the pleat.

Looks great from the front, but....

....there's a huge gap at the end of the seam between black and  yellow.

Go back and stitch exactly on the crease line. 

You will note that all the curves in this post go in one direction only -- no S-curves or multiple-winding roads.  If you want to sew these more complex curves, you'll need a more precise method to make them lie perfectly flat; stay tuned for the next tutorial.

And then there will be more about pressing curved seams in a further installment of Quiltmaking 101.  Wait and read that before you take your seam to the ironing board.

Quiltmaking 101 -- freehand and curved seams 1

The rotary cutter is a blessing for anybody wanting to make straight edges, a huge improvement over tracing around a template with a pencil and then cutting along the line with a scissors.  Rotary cutters, paired with rulers, make perfectly straight edges with very little work.

Although traditional quiltmakers have always worked with ruler-straight edges and seams in most block construction and when sewing blocks together, contemporary artists often prefer the looser look of freehand cutting.  You still use the rotary cutter and mat, but instead of lining your blade up against a ruler you cut without a guide.  Even when an edge/seam looks almost straight, you can see the artist's hand in a freehand line where you don't get that vibe from a ruler-cut line.

On the left, freehand straight lines; on the right, ruler-cut:

Can you see the difference?  It's subtle, especially if you're only looking at one block, but gives a different character to the finished quilt.

The problem with freehand cutting is friction.  In an ideal world, your fabric wouldn't be the least bit slippery and your rotary cutter would be so sharp and roll so smoothly that it would cut a clean edge without pulling at all on the fabric.  You would finish your cut with the two pieces of fabric exactly in their original places, so perfectly aligned that you would barely be able to see that they were cut at all.  In the real world, the blade catches just a bit and pushes or drags the fabric along with it a hair as it rolls along; you'll often see a bubble of fabric moving ahead of the blade as it cuts.  This is especially true if you are cutting two layers of fabric at the same time.

To prevent this, and to make sure that the cut goes exactly where you want it to, it's helpful to hold the fabric in place as you cut.  For short cuts, you just hold it down with your fingers (being careful, of course, not to cut yourself).  For longer cuts, anything over a foot, I like to hold the fabric in place with the plastic ruler, but keep the cutting line at least a quarter-inch away from the edge of the ruler.  That way you get the best of both worlds: the freedom of the freehand cut, where you can wobble or curve your line if you want, plus the ease of cutting fabric that stays where it's supposed to.

When you're joining almost-straight strips and blocks, you can pretty much just put them together and sew a straight seam; the fabric will have enough give to press flat. But as the seams get longer, or as you're joining long rows of blocks, or if your freehand cut had a bit of curve to it, you have to be a little more careful.  If you're not, you can end up with a hill or a valley or both, and even the most diligent pressing won't make them disappear.

Stay tuned for tips on how to sew not-straight pieces of fabric together and still have them come out perfectly flat.

Quiltmaking 101 -- batting cleanup

Several years ago I started a series of blog posts that I call Quiltmaking 101 -- tutorials on all the basics of machine-pieced quilts.  Early installments deal with how to use the rotary cutter, how to stitch seams and how to press.  Moving along through the production process, you can learn how to efficiently sew block-to-block quilts together, how to put the quilt sandwich together, and how to quilt it.  Finally, you can learn how to finish the quilt, with bindings or facings, and how to put a sleeve on for hanging.

I think that somebody who never saw a quilt before could probably learn 99 percent of what she needed to make one by following this series of tutorials.  If you want to read them, they're all right here.

But I realized recently, as I went back to check out one of the posts, that I had left some gaps in the instruction.  Most embarrassing, I realize that I never explicitly discussed freehand cutting -- the heart of improvisational quilting -- and how to sew together a quilt with curvy pieces.  So I am putting together a series of posts on piecing curves.  By that I mean both gently curved seams like these:

and more severe curves like these:

I'll be posting these new tutorials in the next couple of weeks.  Meanwhile, I invite you to look at the Quiltmaking 101 link above and tell me if there are other basic skills that you'd like to see additional tutorials on.

Quiltmaking 101 -- binding your quilt 3 -- folding and stitching the binding

Take your quilt to an ironing surface and lay it face up.  Press the binding out toward the edges of the quilt, admiring how neatly the corners have mitered.  You can't press the binding out beyond the corner, because it isn't long enough to lie flat, so just do the part over the quilt with the tip of your iron.  Or you can just finger-press the binding outward.

Now flip the quilt over face down onto a work surface so you can work along a top edge.  Start in the middle of a side -- we'll do the easy part first before tackling the tricky corners.  Pull the binding over the edge and toward you, pulling as taut as you can.  Fold the binding in two, with the cut edge right up against the cut edge of the quilt, then fold the edge down to just barely cover the stitching line.  If for some reason it isn't wide enough to cover the stitching line, you can ease the fold out a bit; at this point it's more important to cover the stitching line than to extend the binding all the way to the edge on the inside.

Pin the binding in place, every two or three inches.  Work out to the right and left, stopping about three inches from the corners.

Place one corner of the quilt on your work surface, facing top right.  You're confronting a section of binding that kind of stands upright as it turns the corner, because it's not long enough to lie flat.  That's good, because you now have to fold all that extra fabric in at the corner, and the less you have to deal with, the less bulk you'll have at the corner.

On either side of the corner you have already established a final folded width for the binding, and you are now going to finger-press that fold line all the way around the corner.

Once it's creased inward, pin the right-hand side of the binding up toward the corner.  When you get to the corner, take a sturdy needle and use it to push the rest of the binding all the way up to the top edge of the quilt.  Simultaneously, make sure you are pulling the binding as taut as you can around the right-hand edge of the quilt.  Pin the binding in place as close as you can to the edge.

Now fold the top part of the binding down over the needle.  Because you have creased the foldline into the binding, it should stay in place pretty well.  Pin that down quite close to the corner.

Check the corner of the quilt, front and back.

On the front, the diagonal miter should come out of the corner of the seam and go exactly to the corner of the quilt.  The binding should fold over to the back and lie flat, with no bubble at the corner.  If there's a bubble, unpin the bindings and pull the right-hand edge even tauter around the cut edge of the quilt, while urging the top binding to fold down flat.

After you have all four corners mitered and pinned, you can stitch the binding to the quilt.  If you sew by hand, work from the back and stitch through only the backing layer so your stitches aren't visible from the top of the quilt.  If you sew by machine, it's hard to keep a straight stitch exactly on the edge of the binding, both front and back.  But a zigzag stitch camouflages any slight differences in binding width and looks great from both sides.  I like to stitch from the front side of the quilt, centering the zigzag just a bit inside the seamline (closer toward the edge of the quilt).

Sewing the binding with a zigzag stitch -- front of the quilt

Sewing the binding with a zigzag stitch -- back of the quilt