How to Hang a Quilt on the Wall

The best way to hang a quilt on your wall is to sew a fabric hanging sleeve to the back. Here’s how…

What you’ll need:

• A strip of cotton fabric that coordinates with the backing (or plain muslin fabric), 8-1/2 inch wide by the width of your quilt
• Needle & thread
• a wooden dowel
• nails or 2 Command Strip hooks

How to make the hanging sleeve:

Cut an 8-1/2” strip of cotton fabric the same width as your finished quilt. This will make your finished sleeve 4 inches wide. (*NOTE:  if you’re going to enter your quilt in a show, most require a hanging sleeve 4” wide; however, if you’re using a wooden dowel to hang the sleeve on your wall you only need the finished sleeve to be wide enough to slip the dowel through—so you can opt to cut it smaller…see note at bottom.)

Fold under the short ends of your strip 1/4 inch or more and press; then fold it over once more about 1/4” or more and press.  Using your sewing machine, topstitch.

Next fold the strip down the middle the long way (wrong sides together) and iron to make a crease down the center.

Open the strip back up and press each long edge to that center creas.

Now open the strip up again and bring the long edges together (wrong sides together), pin, and machine stitch a 1/4” seam. Now you have a long tube.

Carefully press that seam open. Be careful not to disturb your original press lines on the edges.  (NOTE: You’ll notice that the sleeve doesn’t lie flat—the front side (without the seam) is a bit wider than the back, so it “curls”.  Don’t worry–it’s meant to be that way.)

Lay the back of the sleeve (hemmed side) onto the back of your quilt, positioning the top crease about 1/2” from the top (or just a “smidge” under the binding)—and pin. Then pin the lower creased edge.

By hand, with a needle and matching thread, whip stitch the top creased edge and bottom creased edge to the quilt backing.  (NOTE:  Be sure not to sew all the way through the quilt…we don’t want the stitching to show on the front of the quilt.)

You can also whip stitch the short ends to the quilt…but only the back part…. (NOTE:  Be sure not to whip stitch the front of the short ends—you need the ends open so you can slip the dowel inside the sleeve.)

Again, notice the front of the sleeve will poof out just a bit (see photo below). That’s okay! This is done on purpose to accommodate the width of the wooden dowel (or rod) so that the front of the quilt doesn’t buckle or get distorted when you hang it up.

The wooden dowel can be any diameter, but I like to choose the smallest diameter dowel that can handle the weight of the quilt without bending out of shape.  For most of my quilts and wall hangings, I use a 3/8 to 1/2 inch diameter wooden dowel.  For my smaller wallhangings, I might even use a smaller one. If you’re hanging a very large bed-sized quilt, or a quilt that is unusually heavy, you might want to consider a larger diameter dowel or even use a metal curtain rod.

Cut the wooden dowel about an inch or less than your quilt back.  Twist an eye screw into each end.  Slip the dowel evenly through the hanging sleeve.  Hold the quilt (with dowel) up against your wall, positioning where you want it and being sure it’s level. Then mark with a pencil where the center of the eye screws are.  Then hammer the nails at those marks, and hang the quilt by putting the eye screws on the nails.

If you’d rather not use the eye screws, you can cut the dowel almost the same size as the quilt, and hang the dowel ends directly on command strip hooks or nails instead.

That’s it!  Here’s a photo of my latest quilted wallhanging on my wall…

By the way, this one’s for sale in my Etsy shop.

I hang all of my quilted wall hangings and art quilts this way. Here’s one in my livingroom… and a large landscape art quilt in my diningroom…

And s photo of the hanging sleeve on the back of one of my smaller art quilts. I used a 3/8 inch diameter wooden dowel for this one…

This method of hanging quilts works great for most of my quilted wall hangings and quilts. However, I’ve found a different method for hanging my small art quilts.

If you’d like to see that tutorial, just go to my earlier blog HERE.

Most quilt contests require a hanging sleeve that is 4 inches wide, so by cutting your original strip 8-1/2” it will end up being 4” wide. However, if you’re just hanging it at home, you don’t really need to start with your strip that wide. Just be sure your strip us wide enough so when it’s finished you can insert the dowel through it with a little extra wiggle room (don’t make it too tight).

I hope this tutorial on hanging your quilt is helpful.

Until next time,

HAPPY QUILTING,

Jane

Mulberry Patch Quilts

Make Your Own Washi Tape

Have you ever used a strip of Wash tape to embellish a card, or add to your journal page or scrapbook? They’re beautiful, but although they’re not terribly expensive, if you want a variety to choose from it can add up. Plus I never seem to have exactly the color or style I want.

Well, my friend Carol gave me a tip for making my own…and Since I already had everything I need to make them, I had to try it and share it with you.

What you’ll need:

1. Scotch tape (matt works best, but shiny will work)
2. Magazines
3. Warm water
4. Glue stick

Any glossy magazine page will work. I have plenty of quilting magazines, catalogues and flyers.

To begin, simply tear off a strip of tape (whatever size you want) sticky side down over the top of the picture. It can be a pattern, words, some flowers, leaves…whatever design strikes your fancy.

Here I chose a section of a quilt photo from a catalogue.

Burnish the tape by rubbing it with your fingernail or an old credit card. As a quilter, I happened to have a seam roller for pressing down seams…and it worked great. The object is to get the tape stuck down firmly without any air bubbles.

Then place it in a bowl of warm water. You can tear off the extra magazine page around it first if you like, but it’s not necessary. Here I put the whole page in.

Wait for a few minutes. The tape with the image attached will slip away from the rest of the page. The paper backing slides off the back of the strip of tape completely, but magically leaves the color image transferred to the tape! It becomes part of the tape and is translucent.

Lay the individual tape strips on a clean towel to dry for several minutes. At this point they’re not very sticky, but there may be just enough glue residue left on some strips that they’ll lift up some fiber if you lay them on paper towels–which you don’t want–so a fiber towel is best.

And ta-da! … you have the equivalent of (non-sticky) washi tape strips to use to decorate your cards and scrapbook pages.

To make them sticky, just run a glue stick across the back of the strip when you’re ready to stick them on your page or card. Or you could use any scrapbook glue. Or (if you have one) you could even run them through a xylon stickermaker.

Here are a few of mine..

Aren’t they cute?

Some are bright, and some very subtle (like the leaves above).

They do tend to curl a bit after they’re dry, but I’ve discovered a way to straighten them. Take two sheets of parchment paper–the kind used for baking. Put one on your ironing board (to protect it) and place the strip on top. Then cover that with the second piece of parchment (to protect the iron) and iron for a few seconds.

I understand that besides using pages from magazines or flyers, that this technique will work on anything printed on a laser printer. Since I don’t have a laser printer, I can’t verify how well that works, …but if you have access to one, it would be a great way to make your own washi tape phrases or quotes, …or print out your own photos and computer-generated designs to use.

Hope you’ll give it a try.

Until next time…HAPPY QUILTING,

Jane

Mulberry Patch Quilts

Scrapbuster of a Scrap Quilt

It’s the last challenge of the year (“Scraptastic”) for season 9 of Project Quilting, and if you’ve been following along you know I’ve entered every challenge this year so far. However, for this one I’m really in a time crunch. I think my real challenge will be to finish it in time! The entire quilted item must be started and completely finished (yup, quilted & bound) within one short week.

I’ve got bins and bins full of leftover fabric from years of sewing. Some are so old, I think they might be considered “vintage “…maybe you’ll recognize a few of these prints. I gathered my beiges, browns, threw in a few reds, greens, and blues, and made a plethora of half square triangles.

As I was pinning them up on my design wall, secondary stars began to appear in the pattern…so I purposely went back and placed light contrasting hst in white or beige in those areas to help the stars shine.

You really need to stand back to see them.

It’s a very simple pattern once you lay the hst and squares out to make one block at a time…

It’s a 16 block made up of hst and squares, and depending on where you place the lights and darks, it creates the stretched star.

Here I’ve done a little better job of alternating the beige and white stars. Each block measures 12-1/2 inches (12 inches finished). It’s a great stash buster, but as you can see on the table, half square triangles seem to multiply like bunnies when you’re not looking! The clock is ticking, so to get done in time, I’d better stop now and use those extras in another project.

I found a great backing in my stash, and here it is on my trusty Tin Lizzy ready to quilt. I’m planning to do straight lines around each of the stars and then fill in with meandering and loops between the stars with swirls inside the centers…leaving the star points unquilted so they pop.

I decided on a faux flange binding.

And here it is…finished just in time!

Hope you’ll stop by Project Quilting and vote for your favorites Mine is #50, hint-hint). Voting begins Sunday, March 25, 2018 (I think voting runs through Friday).

It’s now for sale in my shop here.

Until next time,

Happy Quilting!

Jane

Mulberry Patch Quilts

Project Quilting Stitch in Time Entry

So…I thought about the challenge for Project Quilting this week…A STITCH IN TIME SAVES NINE. And nothing came to me for several days. I thought this would be the week I just didn’t enter.

Then, as I was thinking about the time change this Sunday…and about having more daylight, …the sun was shining (even though we did get more snow a few days ago)…and the birds were singing outside. They weren’t singing their usual winter chirps, but their special beautiful spring time songs! Then I thought about how I should be saving bits of colorful ribbon, yarn, and little strips of fabric and putting them outside so the birds could use them because they’ll be building their nests soon. And the idea for the challenge came to me…

I started to equate “a stitch in time” with the little birds getting their nests “stitched” together with bits of string and twigs. And then I started to visualize nests made out of fabric selvages and bright fabric strips. And the idea started taking shape!

I used scraps from my stash to flip and sew the background, and fused the appliqué shapes on top. Then cut up a bunch of my selvedge edges I’ve been saving and quilted them down to create the nest.

I even found the Stonehedge fabric selvage from their fabric called “a stitch in time”!! What are the chances? Totally unplanned! How cool was that?

So here’s my entry for Project Quilting Season 9, Challenge #5 “A Stitch in Time”. I hope you’ll stop by the website to vote for your 10 favorite entries. Voting starts after noon (Wisconsin time) on Sunday, March 11, 2018 and I think it runs through Friday, March 16, 2018.,

Until next time…HAPPY QUILTING!

Jane

Mulberry Patch Quilts

Mellow Yellow Organizer

So I’m enjoying a few days on a quilting retreat at the lovely Jones Mansion Retreat Center. I always enjoy a few days away to relax, refresh, regenerate with a few quilting friends (new and old). I always get a lot of projects done (or at least started) and I always get inspired by my friends and their projects. So much creativity and talent!

This week I was in a room I’ve never had before — the Ivy Room. Isn’t it beautiful?

I’ve been able to enter small art quilts in the first two challenges of Project Quilting Season 9, and made woven fabric into a cell phone bag for the third challenge. But between all that was going on this week, plus packing and organizing for the retreat, I didn’t seem to have time for this challenge.

Then, today, the wonderful owner of the mansion gave us her own pattern and her tutoring skills (she’s an expert quilter and seamstress) to make an organizing mat to go under our sewing machines. I ran down to the local fabric store and found the perfect fabric … one with yellow measuring tape, and the other with spools of thread–many of them yellow.

Isn’t it the cutest?

After sewing it together, I added some YELLOW rick-rack and pink binding with a serpentine stitch.

Here it is…ta-da!

It’ll keep all my needed gadgets right by me and help keep things organized… Hmmmm…it has lots of YELLOW, and finding all my sewing gadgets and goodies at the ready makes me MELLOW! So … I know it’s a bit of a stretch, but I entered it in the “Mellow Yellow” challenge for Project Quilting Season 9 this week!❤️. I hope you’ll click on the link and vote for your favorite quilted entries. Voting begins Sunday (Feb 25) through Friday (Mar 2, 2018).

The mat will be great to bring along to retreats and classes, and it can do double-duty as a dust cover when I’m away from my machine… (which is never for long)!

Super cool. Thanks so much Lori!

For more info on other fabulous quilting (and sewing) retreats at the Jones Mansion In Historic Mineral Point, Wisconsin, see my earlier blog here Or visit their website here. You can even rent out the space for your very own retreat with friends.

Until next time, HAPPY QUILTING!

Jane

Mulberry Patch Quilts

.

Project Quilting 9.3: Bold & Brave, Fabric Weaving Technique

So for challenge #3 of this ninth season of Project Quilting we got the words “bold & brave”.

It was interesting to me that Kim had mentioned the new wefty needle process for weaving strips of fabric together. I’ve been wanting to try that technique, and now would be the perfect week to do it.

It’s something new, so I’ll be BRAVE by getting out of my comfort zone. And I’ll use some of my BOLD hand dyed fabrics in bright red, pink, with a bit of yellow throw in. And for the background, I’ll add some of my hand dyed teal greens. All the strips will go beautifully with a fat quarter of Tula Pink’s BOLD kitty fabric That I simply love.

The first challenge I had was that I don’t own that cool wefty needle…which, btw, I DO intend to purchase in the very near future. But because we’re expecting a snow storm today, I didn’t feel like trecking out to find it and online isn’t fast enough (I want it now!), So I found a tool from my old clothing sewing days that might work. It’s intended to help you insert elastic in your waistband. For today, it will just have to do.

The next challenge was finding my Clover 1/2″ bias tape maker. I knew I had an entire set of them somewhere. But where? A-hah, I found them…in every size imaginable, EXCEPT the 1/2 inch size. So, again not wanting to venture out, I decided to go with smaller strips and use my 1/4 inch bias tape make instead. I may as well be bold AND brave (or is that “stupid”)?

I decided on a modern box weaving pattern that I can use with the Tula Pink fabric to make some kind of a bag. I liked the fresh, modern look. Of course it’s one of the more difficult weaves … and right off the bat I wove the first 5 rows wrong and had to take them out and start over…but I CAN DO this (be bold, be brave, be courageous!!)…be persistent!

Here I’m beginning my first try…no, no, no

And here I’m re-weaving them on my second and more successful try…

Ahhhh!  Much better…at least I hope so. You know the old saying…”measure twice, cut once”? Well in this case it’s “count twice before weaving in the next strip”!

…notice the cute little “boxes” that are formed in the weave? …love it!

Isn’t it cute with my Tula Pink kitty fabric?

Now to decide what to make…hmmmmm.

I looked through every pattern and book I own, and decided on the “snack sack” from Atkinson Designs, “Big Bags, Little Bags”. I’m had to make some changes (not quite big enough) and I wanted to adapt it as a small bag to carry my cell phone & keys (cross body  strap) so I can grab my phone & keys when I take Snicks for a walk. …perfect!

Oops…forgot to insert the rings BEFORE sewing the loops onto the bag! Yikies! Good thing I could open up the rings and slide each through their fabric loop…

Here’s the inside (lining side) of the cell phone bag … it’s quilted to the woven front, French side seams done, & bottom sewn & zigzagged…no batting needed, and it’s ready to turn right side out. and bind the top edge.

Snicks approves, but was not happy to be woken up from her nap in the sunshine to see it.  She’s not overly enthusiastic.

I’m happy with it.

My phone fits perfectly inside the little bag, and I can attach a ring to add my keys.

Found the perfect button in my stash!

 

This is the photo I think I’ll use for PR

I’m done early!  Voting for Project Quilting Season 9, Challenge #3 starts SUNDAY AFTERNOON, FEB 11 through FRIDAY, FEB 16.  I hope you’ll come vote for your ten favorite quilted objects (and of course I hope one of your votes is for mine).

Oh, BTW, I DID order the Wefty Needle from Tara’s ETSY SHOP: WEFTYneedle.  I’m sure her tool will make my next project easier and faster.  Can’t wait to get it and try weaving a different pattern–only next time I’ll do it with 1/2 inch or 1 inch folded strips instead of 1/4 inch.  …that reminds me…where IS that 1/2 inch bias tape maker of mine??

Until next time, HAPPY QUILTING!

Jane

Mulberry Patch Quilts

(Madison WI)

Project Quilting 9.2 Entry: Mosaic Falling Leave

I’m still intrigued by the idea of fabric mosaics, so I thought I’d carry that idea a step further into this week’sProject Quilting 9.2 “Triangulation“. It’s risky… because I’m not sure this will work–it could be a huge failure, but I think it’s worth a try.

Instead of cutting the square fabric tiles,like I did in my last post, this time I’m thinking of stepping it up a notch by cutting the tiny squares into even tinier triangles and placing them onto an overall gridded pattern to replicate leaves or vines cascading down in shades of green and brown … very organic, very arts & crafts (which I love). I happened upon a beautiful tiled wall and that was the inspiration for this idea.  Plus, it gave me a good reason to use up some of the lovely fabrics I hand dyed.

I’ll start by drawing a grid on paper to use as a guide for placement, and cover that with the Steam-a-Seam 2–with one uncovered sticky side up. I can use my 3/8″ slotted template to cut the squares & then cut them in half corner-to-corner to make lots and lots (and lots) of triangles. I don’t want the triangles too large, since my Steam-a-Seam 2 sheet that I happen to have on hand is only 9×11 inches or so…and I only have a few days to get it done–the challenge deadline is fast approaching (hope I make it).

I wonder if the idea will translate well as I progress filling in the grid one by one with different values of green…and then brown…? Hmmmmm.

Little by little, one triangle at a time, it’s beginning to take shape…

It almost looks like a forest to me at this point.

I’m thinking a charcoal gray Kona cotton fabric will work best for the background “grout”. Black might be too dark and get lost in the top half of the quilt, and white might be too much of a contrast. I’ll have to audition a few grays to get the right one.

After ironing the quilt sandwich together with batting and backing fabric, I’m off to my sewing machine to stitch between the “tiles” with matching gray cotton thread.

That’s done!  And I’ve added the border (simple gray).  So I’m on the home stretch! Time to do a little hand sewing on the binding…I always save the last bit of my assortment of Aurifil threads in a special place for my hand sewing…

I love my little doll pincushion that my friend brought me back from her trip to Liberty of London…(I almost hate to stick her with pins!)

What do you think about it Snicks? … too tired to comment?

Done, done, done…with a few hours to spare…whew!  Time to get a square photo uploaded for the contest.  Since it’s not square, I hope this one will be the best choice…

Please stop by at the website for Project Quilting Season 9: Triangulation to vote for your 10 favorite quilts”!

Voting starts Sunday afternoon (January 28, 2018) and ends on Saturday (February 3, 2018).

Until next time, HAPPY QUILTING!

Jane

Mulberry Patch Quilts