Now the original quilt i made for her bed (while gorgeous) was made with a Union Jack flag panel. And so while it was a fine fit for her cot it no longer fit her bed when you have a toddler who climbs in and out of bed 3 times a night, it inevitably ends up on the floor.
And so after having picked up some lovely drill from Spotlight with the essential blue & red in it i set to work- The blanket reconstruction.
Step 1 - Lay out original blanket and have toddler stand on it while you plot your next move ;-)
Step 2 - Lay it on top of your new fabrics so that you can see the size difference and gauge how much extra fabric you will need. I decided that the hearts fabric would be my backing fabric.
And waste not want not, the original backing fabric was just plain blue cotton. So that
was to become my new border around the flag panel.
Step 3- Unpick your the old blanket so that you have 3 pieces- your back, your panel and of course your batting. Now your possibly thinking your batting is too small. Thats ok. So was mine! But i did have spare batting lying around so we remedied that by joining 2 pieces together!
Step 4 -Now work out the new border around your panel. I decided to make it nice and easy and just do a row of blue above and bellow the panel. Use a simple straight stitch and sew them to either size.
Step 5 - Now you need to layer your fabric ready for the final sew. THIS IS IMPORTANT Your layers go batting, then your bottom fabric, then your top fabric (panel) with the 2 fabrics right sides FACING each other. I have made this mistake previously when making quilts. I know it seems odd and your most likely thinking "but i want the batting in the middle??!!??" But trust me. When you turn it it will make sense.
Step 6 - So pin and sew all the way around leaving a gap for turning. You should have your 3 layers looking like this -->
Step 7 - Put your hand in between the 2 FABRIC LAYERS and turn inside out - Now its making sense - you should end up with the batting as the middle layer! AHHHHH!!!
Step 8 - Sew your opening closed either with a simple top stitch or my preferred method a ladder stitch (see how to do a ladder stitch here).
Pretty finished blanket. Yay! Some time in the not too distant future i will show you how to quilt it. For now it needs to go to bed with a toddler this evening. So it can wait. But there you go. A small cot sized quilt to a decent sized single bed blanket.
