copycat

I am making a baby quilt. I have the Pieced Cotton top, Hobbs 80/20 batting,and Shannon Cuddle Luxe Minky backing. I also plan to attach a satin polyester ruffle. How should I proceed?

Should I free-motion quilt the top with the batting first, without the thick cuddle backing?

If so, next I would square up the quilted top and baste the ruffle to the quilt top. After basting the ruffle, I would lay the plush cuddle luxe fabric right sides together with the quilted top + ruffle and sew around 4 sides and leave an opening to turn. Last I would turn the quilt top and minky back right sides out and top-stitch around the 4 sides to close the hole and hold the ruffle in place. The baby quilt size is 42.5" square. Should I do any further quilting to hold the layers?

Using a ruffle and minky back are 2 firsts for me. I am following the new mom to be"s request. As always, I appreciate your advice.

aashley333

I backed a t shirt quilt with furry gray fabric! I SID through all 3 layers. I placed newsprint between machine and fuzzy fabric. I folded the fuzzy side to the front for a fuzzy frame around the quilt.

qltnmom

I would add more quilting to stabilize the minky after adding the ruffle.

Iceblossom

I would complete my quilting first, just as I would for any other project.

I would construct my ruffle within a casing, as I showed in this thread:
Give me your Ruffle Making tips please!

People more talented than I can carefully pin everything and go around it just once with a straight or zig zag. I have to open up one side, sew that, fold it back over, and then hand finish on the back just like I do my normal binding.

The easiest way to turn corners is use something like a quarter as a circular guide. You can miter but it is an additional thought process to make sure fabric doesn't get tucked in/out the wrong way. Really, that slight curve is highly recommended and it is rarely noticeable, even with very square/grided designs.

Depending on what you use for your ruffle (you might want to treat lace differently, a carefully done miter isn't so bad, especially if you gathered your ruffle yourself. Stabilize the gather and then take it out where your seam will be, whether diagonal or straight. Sew closed, regather, and finish with invisible edge.

quiltingshorttimer

I would quilt with the batting and minky backing,do some type of binding--maybe just bringing the backing up and over the edge (turn under the raw edge) and then adding the satin ruffle on top of that. I've done one baby quilt with a ruffle and tried to tuck it between the layers as I went--did not work so had to re-do as I suggested to get it to work correctly.

copycat

I think stitch in the ditch is a good idea. Thank you for sharing your pretty quilt.

copycat

I am trying to grasp what happens to the raw edge of the ruffle if the ruffle is added last if I am bringing the backing up over the edge for the binding. What am I missing? thank you

Rhonda K

A technique that may work for your project. Simply replace the prairie points with the ruffle. I like how the background is bigger than needed and then cut down to size.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJenRhhbi4A

quiltingshorttimer

is this a pre-ruffled ruffle? if so you can just make a narrow binding to cover that raw edge and lay it right on top of the binding and sew it on with a decorative stitch. If you are making the ruffle, but make the edge part a bit wider and fold under and then sew onto the quilt. When I made a quilt with a ruffle, I used a pre-ruffled ruffle and it had a narrow binding on the edge so it make it easy to sew down. Otherwise I would have made the edge wide enough and just turned under before I sewed it down.

copycat

I am a visual learner so I appreciate the video link. I also like the fact she had the backing fabric larger than the quilt top and trimmed after sewing. I am going to do a trial on a smaller scale to see how the minky behaves. My worry is the minky may stretch and end up being larger than the quilt top after turning right sides out. Many thanks!