Part 2: After making a plan and creating colorful scrap triangles and rectangles, I sewed the triangles and rectangles together to make squares. The pieces were sewn together with the wrong side facing so the seam would be on the front to be ragged. I cut the seam with little slits about 1/8″ apart. I cut very close to the seam stitches. Once in awhile, I accidentally cut the stitches. I put a sewing clip on the cut section to remind myself to sew that area together as I sewed the large “X’s”.
Next, I began working on the second major part of the scrap rag quilt, deciding on the bottom fabric and layout, and cutting the center layer. I chose three colors of cotton for the bottom layer, and a random pattern. I sketched it out so I could place the colors in the correct place.
I decided on fleece for the center as an inlay. I cut the fleece squares to 12″. This meant there wouldn’t be fleece in the ragged seam.
Once all the top squares, middle inlays, and bottom squares were cut, I decided to stack all the square layers together square by square. I laid the bottom layer down, centered a fleece on that, then the top piece on top.
I made a nice tall pile of these layers to get them ready to sew “X’s” on them.
Before sewing the “X’s”, I made sure each layer was centered neatly. 2 Clips per side is a nice amount to keep the layers steady.
I kept the sewn layers in order so it would be easy to sew them into strips. Does this look like a CA king quilt?
The plan is to sew them into strips, rag them, then sew 2 strips together at a time so it isn’t hard to sew the whole blanket together. This step took about 2 weeks, bringing the total working time up to 8 weeks.
**Some people sew two straight stitches per square or strip for extra durability.
