Children quilting

I thought I would share my 7 year old granddaughter’s sewing achievement.  Since the beginning of this year she has been really into dyeing and sewing.  She spends much after school time and holidays with us so the request to dye and sew is frequent.  She is now on her 5th cushion – her first patchwork one.  She discovered some 5″Bali charm squares.  Quickly she discarded the ones she didn’t like and had the start for her project.  She needed more so raided the stash for more.  I cut them out for her.  She is getting so proficient with her sewing that all I did was pass her a pinned pair at  a time.  I didn’t help her with the sewing at all except for a tip of what to do when the fabric starts getting sucked in at the start of sewing a pair.  So she also learnt about chain piecing and adding a lead piece of fabric to stop the sucking in happening.

 

I started her off by sewing along the edge of A4 paper with no thread in the needle.  She then progressed to sewing along a drawn line still without thread.  As my machines are set up permanently she would come and sew, then go and play come back and sew.  Then we introduced thread but still sewed around the A4 sheet.  Then when she felt she was ready she sewed along the edge of a two pieces of fabric and then along drawn lines.  She then put together her painted cushion cover with a piece of dyed fabric.  The seams were straight enough for this purpose.  She then made her mum a chenilled cushion.  It was a great way to practice straight sewing but added an interest to her sewing.  I did do the cutting for the chenilling. She  put together her brother’s painted cushion and progressed to  naturally dying fabric for a cushion with leaves from their garden which she then made up.  This time she said she wanted to make one with squares.  So here we are – with a patchwork cushion on the way.  She is halfway through sewing on the velcro.  She is now thinking about doing a little quilt.  Lucky for me that her desire to design and make some clothes is going to be directed to my sister-in-law as I was hopeless in that department.

What a joy seeing the young ones take an interest