Suggestions for a quilt using 52 yards of different fabric!!!
 

My daughter started a photo a week project with her new baby. So each week she uses one yard of a different fabric for the background. I will take that fabric and make a quilt. I've encouraged her to at least make each month's fabrics coordinate - ie the first month she used all pinks, etc.

I'm at a loss as to what pattern to use for this quilt. I would like to make a block that contains four or five fabrics. That way I could use a months worth of fabric for each block. I realize I will have a lot of fabric left over and am thinking that I could make another quilt further down the line as the little angel grows.

Thanks so much for any suggestions! Love this board - you all are so supportive of each other!

I don't have any suggestions about the quilt, but welcome to the board where you will learn much!

Postage stamp? That way you only need a little of each fabric.

How about a Dresden plate? That could use as many fabrics as you want for the blades in each plate.

What a great idea she has and what a record of growth and change. Welcome.

9-patch? You can make the squares quite small.

This is an interesting idea.

Maybe a string quilt? You could make a couple or three blocks with a mixture of the month's fabrics. It wouldn't use much though. Thinking long term, you might save the rest for a later quilt. I saved scraps from when I made my daughter's childhood clothing and made a quilt for her daughter from them.

52 yards? that's gonna have to be a mighty BIG quilt!!! LOL

The 1600 quilts use 2 1/2 inch strips sewn together. You could change the size to be 1 1/2 inch so that each would finish at 1 inch, so 52 would only be 52 inches long. This would be fun, because you could use the strips in the same order that she is using them. Even more fun, would be to print several of the month's pic on fabric and include them in the quilt. Or just a first pic and then one at a year and then surround them with the strips. This is such a great opportunity for both of you to document the first year. It will be neat if she includes fabrics for the holidays or seasons of the year so that you get a real timeline feel with the quilt.

Or, what if you use the strips to make log cabin blocks with her pics as the centers. You may have to add a neutral to make everything flow.

I am laughing at myself, because I can think up some of the most fun projects to add to my hundred or so that I already have to quilt. Please show us your progress as you get going.

What a great idea. Hope she can keep up with it. I had a similar thought when my first one was born. Unfortunately, somewhere along the line it went by the wayside.

There are dozens and dozens of scrappy quilt patterns. pick one

What a wonderful idea. First of all, I hope that SHE is buying the fabric. Secondly, before suggesting a pattern, how confident a quilter are YOU? Are you looking for a pattern for the baby's first year? What size are you thinking about? Establish the parameters and then you can refine the design.

hummmmmmmmmmmm, been cogitating. How about doing a rag quilt? Here's my thinking. In the first couple months you could put together a 3 X 3 square for a tiny quilt for a tiny girl. In 3 weeks add 3 more squares. You'll already have a "finished" quilt in hand and yet it will be growing with the baby. And since you've got plenty of fabric, you can make all three layers of your quilt the same fabric. Every few weeks add more squares to keep the quilt even.

At the start, if you do this, you are going to have to give up any idea of coordinating your colors.

This is assuming your DD and GD live fairly close to you, so you can all enjoy the quilt.. At 13 months (56 weeks) you'd have a quilt about the right size for little sis to use for several years.

One more thing----------what size of squares??????? I'd say to finish out at 8" . At 13 months you'd have a quilt 56" by 64" about perfect for a young girl.

I would suggest my favorite quilt .... an I-Spy quilt. But there are so many suggestions here that you could do all of them with all the yardage you will be collecting. What a great way to celebrate a baby's first year!

Very clever idea. You could grow the quilt outward from the center square which would be the first picture.

Are you SURE you want a full yard of each fabric?? That's over $500 just for fabric and you'll be using less than a quarter yard for each of the 52 photo blocks, a bit more for the 4 corner blocks to fill out the rectangle, and then some for borders, binding, and backing. Think about it.

I would guess that she wants to build a stash as well! :)

1) A yo-yo quilt
2) scrappy version of Grandmother's Flower Garden (super cute if the baby is a little girl, could be a nice item for her hope chest as a Queen sized quilt)
3) reversible quilt
4) an applique baby quilt for 1st b-day -- I just made one of these dimensional doll dress quilts for my niece (actually, I sized it down, cutting off the 4th row of dresses & all of the outermost pink-and-white borders) and added her name to the border in puffy letters. So cute you could just eat it up ... and she had tried her hardest to do just that! lol
McCall's pattern 6412
http://mccallpattern.mccall.com/m641...hp?page_id=909
You could do each of the floral yo-yo's in a different fabric and maybe add some more color to the outer borders or replace the outer borders entirely with a single piano key border). The only things I would suggest if you are doing this quilt pattern is (1) tack down the edges of all the yo-yo's if it's going to a baby because they will want to pull those things right off the quilt, and (2) who knows why McCall's has so many baby quilts that call for tiny buttons, but obviously that's insane. I got custom iron-on button stickers from irononsticker.com (so cute, they have the little button holes punched out and everything -- unlimited colors. Just peel & press. :) Other than that, it turned out super cute & requires quite a number of different fabrics. You could use some of the applique fabrics in the piano key border & add some more.
Final size of mine was 54"x42" (3 rows of dresses, inner border & an outer border that was 4" on top/bottom, 2" on sides). I think it would look slightly better with a 4" border all around if you're doing piano keys. You could definitely get all 52 fabrics in doing 2-3" width strips.

If it's a boy, I would suggest this "Little Monsters" pattern by Don't Look Now! http://dontlooknow.bigcartel.com/pro...ittle-monsters. Just have to keep fabrics in the same color families so it doesn't get too crazy.

What about doing a block a month with each months' fabrics, and print a photo for the centre circle, something like this one.
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the daughter is buying the fabic pieces to be used as a back drop for weekly photos. If the fabric is purchased on sale, DD can probably get by for 5-6 dollars per yard.

The fact of the matter is that this is going to be a very special photographic presentation. ONE really good sitting with a professional would probably be in that price range.

I agree. You could make 5 Queen size quilts with that much fabric. Might want her to buy a quarter of a yard instead of a whole yard.

Thanks for the welcome!

What a great idea. I would go for a small block that needed a light fabric and a dark fabric. And then make lots of them. Maybe this Boxing Day pattern or Bonnie Hunter's Carolina Chain.
http://www.favequilts.com/Throws-and...rom-Martingale
http://quiltville.blogspot.com/2014/...decisions.html
http://www.quiltmaker.com/articles/Carolina_Chain

"The 1600 quilts use 2 1/2 inch strips sewn together. You could change the size to be 1 1/2 inch so that each would finish at 1 inch, so 52 would only be 52 inches long. This would be fun, because you could use the strips in the same order that she is using them. Even more fun, would be to print several of the month's pic on fabric and include them in the quilt. Or just a first pic and then one at a year and then surround them with the strips. This is such a great opportunity for both of you to document the first year. It will be neat if she includes fabrics for the holidays or seasons of the year so that you get a real timeline feel with the quilt. "

I just love Barb's idea! You could do a series of quilts that might cover ages 1-3 months, 4-6 months, etc.

I just made a propeller quilt and each block takes 4 different fabrics and the blocks measure 10 inches. I made mine using 12 blocks and then a different fabric for the sashing between the blocks. So that's 49 different fabrics in one quilt. You could use the other 3 fabrics as backing and another narrow sashing and then the binding. Voila all 52 in one quilt.

Wow thanks everyone for all these amazing suggestions! Just to clarify my daughter is buying the fabric and so far Hobby Lobby has been cheapest for her. She did the same thing with her first baby and I made a scrappy postage stamp type quilt but wasn't really happy with how that one turned out. I have lots of fabric left and will make him another quilt some day as well.

I was hoping to make this one no quite so scrappy. Right now I'm leaning towards a dresden. I made my daughter a king size dresden and swore I'd never make anything that big again but I've had some more experience and think I can handle it better this time.

But again thanks so much! You all are just amazing and generous with your time! I'll keep you posted and try to post some pics.

How would I print a photo for the quilt? I'm not familiar with that process. Thanks again!

You just need a color inkjet printer & you can do it yourself at home. You can print right on a solid fabric with this:
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_no...photo%20fabric
or you can print an iron-on decal that you can then press onto a 2nd fabric with this:
http://www.amazon.com/June-Tailor-Fu...t+photo+fabric

I suppose you could do that with the first product & some fusible web, but I would recommend just going with the 2nd product if that's your plan. There are different brands & larger quantity bundles available. You want to make sure to get the right one for either light or dark colored fabrics. Also, read the description & reviews carefully as some hold up much better in the wash than others. I haven't done it myself yet personally (planning to do one for my mom for Christmas), but I think June Tailor's brand is a good one. Maybe others could confirm.

I love the idea of putting the baby's photos in the block each month. So adorable. Unfortunately, the decent printable photo fabrics aren't cheap, so unless you can manage to get more than one photo per 8.5x11" sheet, it could easily run you $40-50.

If you don't own an InkJet & can't hook up with a friend who has one every month or two, you can also take your photos over to a local print shop. Many times they are able to print on fabric for you. I know fabric designers talk about having done that to print a sample to send to fabric manufacturers & my sister found a local print shop by her that did that, but if you don't have any in your area, you can do it online with Spoonflower.

What an adorable idea. Perhaps she could use one of the fabrics for one week each month,maybe the first week. This would aid you in making the quilt and give a point of reference of growth. It would be great if she could coordinate with a stuffed animal or toy. I did a photo a month with each of my boys then took their outfits to make a quilt.

Have you looked at the Take Five books and you tube?

How about a Grandmother's Flower Garden. You can use a huge variety of fabrics for this and then applique the flowers to a white or neutral background and make the quilt any size you want. It would be a quilt she could treasure all of her life.

Any block of the month.

My thought what about a Sunbonnet Sue or appliques of the Dolly prints and have them looking into a hand mirror or a wall mirror with the mirror being the baby's photo print. If you do the dolly print you could just use the face, arms, and legs; you could make her dress, shoes etc. out of some of that months fabrics. And if you wanted to use more fabrics add other things to the block like butterflies, flowers, something seasonal for that month. You could even do a mini quilt in the background.

Each month with 4 weeks could be 4 patch and 5 weeks you could make the 10 minute block. Then border around each month (color) with white. Great that she is doing this the rest of the material could be made into a comfort for TV watching. My kids love them around 48 inches by 56 inches.

Just a thought from a grandmother of 7. Perhaps plan your quilt for 52 squares and not even squares of the same size. For the first week make a wholecloth design. For the next week do a square that has two fabrics, then three, etc. You can get ideas for the squares from lots of websites or books. At some point you might want to limit the number of fabrics to several of the latest she used for backgrounds. Some of the squares could be postage stamp style using a piece of each fabric used to that point such as a four patch, a nine patch, a sixteen patch, a twenty-five patch, etc. This sounds like a really fun project. Good luck to both of you for keeping up the pace and finishing it for baby's first birthday.

When I first saw your title, I thought "Oh My Goodness, this girl is going to make a quilt to cover her whole town!!!"
Now that I read it, I see your predicament. I like the ideas given to make a log cabin with the coordinating fabric from each month, The pics would be nice too

What a fun idea! The Double Slice Layer Cake would work well. Each block uses four fabrics. I have made a couple out of scrappy fabrics and they turn out fantastic.

I had the same idea, but how about using it as a challenge quilt and learning to do a simple portrait with postage stamp squares, of mom and dad for the baby?

checkout Take 5 quilt patterns. they use 5 different fabrics in a block.

How about Chinese Coins, use small strips of each piece in the coins and a solid piece for the between pieces. There will be a lot of leftovers so use them in other quilts or make baby dresses!