13131 - A Palindromic Number Of Views For My All Time Most Popular Blog Post

This is such a fun quilt to make.
It is one so many of my friends, former students, people from other countries and who knows who else have made.
My sister in law Sue Sorensen had never made a quilt and she was very successful creating this one.
I think my friend Cassandra Philpot in Australia holds the record for making more of them than anyone else.
I love to help people choose the fabric for this one. I actually have a whole box of fabrics cut that I can put kits together for it but haven’t had time to offer them.
SO HERE IT IS –SUNRISE, SUNSET QUILT TUTORIAL - DRUM ROLL PLEASE!

There has been so much interest in this quilt I thought I'd share how I did it with you.
As I said before I got the idea on line somewhere but I don't know where.
That is almost irrelevant as I "did my own thing" - just using the basic idea.
FABRIC REQUIREMENTS
38 different fabric strips. Each one should be 2 1/2 inches wide by the width of the fabric.
An accent fabric - 1/2 yard
SELECTING YOUR FABRICS
I suggest you choose fabrics that have something in common, but still have a variety of light, medium and dark.
I would also suggest you do not chose large prints with a lot of colors in them as they create their own set of design issues. Save them for something else.
TIPS FOR CHOOSING AN ACCENT FABRIC
1. Your accent fabric should contrast with each one of your fabrics. An example of that would be if you choose to use green and blue fabrics for your strips, you might choose pink or red for the accent.
2. It is also a good idea to choose an accent fabric that is more dramatic than the fabrics you chose for you strips.

ARRANGING THE ORDER OF YOUR FABRICS
1. Try to arrange your fabrics so the values and colors are evenly distributed in the order of the strips.
2. You can not preplan what is going to go next to what else so it is important you have kept this in mind when deciding the order of the strips. The finished quilt will be a pleasant surprise if you keep this in mind.
CUTTING
1. Cut a 2 1/2 inch by the width of the fabric strip from each of your fabrics. It is not necessary nor desirable that they each be exactly the same length
2. Cut 38 2 1/2 inch x 4 1/2 inch pieces from your accent fabric.
CONSTRUCTION - NOW THE FUN BEGINS!
You will sew all of the fabrics and spacers together to create one long strip which will measure approximately 1750 inches long.
1. Cut off 18 inches from the first strip and throw it in your scrap bin or the wastebasket. DO NOT USE IT
2. To the end of this first strip sew a spacer.
3. Sew the next long strip to the other end of the spacer.
4. Sew another spacer to the end of this strip.
5. Continue in this manner until you have sewn all the strips and spacers together ending with spacer.

6. Press seams to one side.
CREATING THE QUILT TOP FROM THE ONE LONG STRIP
1. Bring both ends of the strip to meet and place them right sides together.
2. Sew them together and you will now have a piece that is about 875" long.
Cut them apart on the fold at the end of the seam. (Do not press the seam now - You will do that later)
3. Match up both end of your strip and sew them together just as you did the first seam. This time you will only have to sew about 437 inches. Cut open on the seam as you did before.


4. Do the same thing 3 more times for a total of 5 seams. The last one will be about 55 inches.

PRESSING
Now it is time to press all the seams to one side.
I press first from the back with a dry iron.
I turn it over and press carefully from the front with a steam iron, making sure if there are any tucks in my pressing I press them out.
When all the strips have been sewn together I do a row of stitching less than 1/4 inch away from the edge to prevent any stitching that has been cut from coming undone.

All that is left is the quilting and finishing.
BET YOU CAN'T MAKE JUST ONE!