Beginner-Friendly Peekaboo Scrap Quilt
Hey there - it's Wendy of The Weekend Quilter back with another beginner-friendly, scrap-busting quilt project. The Peekaboo Scrap Quilt tutorial takes you through how to make a baby sized (40" x 40") and throw-sized (60" x 70") quilt and highlights the Sew Straight™ Laser Vision guide feature that is built into the Brother Innovis BQ3100. Don't worry if you do not have this feature on your sewing machine. The instructions will also cover steps without the built-in laser guide.
Supplies and Tools:
- Fabric requirements:
Fabric quantities are based on 42" WOF (width of fabric). The fabrics used in this tutorial are scraps from my stash. You are encouraged to create your project with scraps from your stash. With that said, the fabric requirements below show how much you'll need if you wish to create this project with yardage.
Tip: Before gathering and cutting into fabrics, rummage through your container, or turn over your bag, box, or wherever your store your straps, and roughly sort your stash by color. This is going to help you guesstimate and plan the colors or theme of your scrappy project.
- Basic sewing machine – the Brother Innovis BQ3100 from the Quilt Club Series was used in this tutorial.
- Rotary cutter
- Quilting rulers
- Measuring tape
- Cutting mat
- Fabric scissors
- Seam ripper
- Batting – There needs to be at least 4" overhang on each side of the quilt top. For example, minimum batting requirement for the baby quilt is 48" x 48" (40" x 40" finished quilt size), minimum batting requirement for throw quilt is 68" x 78" (60" x 70" finished quilt size).
- Sewing pins
- Iron
- Coordinating thread, 50wt cotton – for piecing squares together and decorative quilting stitches
- Basting spray (if spray basting) or safety pins (if pin basting)
- Hera marker or blunt butter knife
- Brother Compact MuVit Digital Dual Feed Foot or walking foot attachment
- Quilting gloves
- Machine-washable fabric pen or pencil – optional if sewing machine has the Sew Straight™ Laser Vision Sewing Guide
Quilt Size (finished size) |
Background Fabric (Fabric A) |
Peeks Fabric (Fabric B) |
Backing fabric | Binding fabric |
Baby (40" x 40") |
Scrappy: At least 1⅝ yards (149 cm) Yardage: 1⅝ yards (149 cm) |
Scrappy: At least ⅝ yards (58 cm) Yardage: ⅝ yards (58 cm) |
2⅝ yards (241 cm) | ½ yard (46 cm) |
Throw (60" x 70") |
Scrappy: At least 4 yards (366 cm) Yardage: 4 yards (366 cm) |
Scrappy: At least 1½ yards (138 cm) Yardage: 1½ yards (138 cm) |
3⅞ yards (355 cm) | ⅝ yard (58 cm) |
Background
The Peekaboo Scrap quilt project utilizes the quick-corner piecing method to achieve the little pops of triangles throughout the project. This project aims to tackle the little square scraps you’ve been saving up.
The Sew Straight™ Laser Vision Guide is perfect for projects like this because you don’t need to spend the time and effort drawing the diagonal guidelines on each of the itty-bitty squares and just jump straight to the sewing fun after all the cutting.
Without further ado, let’s get started!
Directions:
Similar to a cooking recipe, read through all the instructions before you start. This will help you identify what supplies you will need and give you an understanding of what to expect throughout the project.
General Instructions
- Sew all right sides together with ¼'' seam allowances, unless specified.
- Share your Peekaboo Scrap moments on social media by tagging. @the.weekendquilter @BrotherSews #TheWeekendQuilte #BrotherSews #PeekabooScrapQuilt
- Cutting
- Piecing
- With a fabric marker or pencil, on the wrong side of all 2'' squares and 1½'' squares, draw a diagonal guideline from the top left corner to the right bottom corner. If you have the Sew Straight™ Laser Vision Guide on your machine, you can skip this step.
- Noting the orientation of the marked diagonal guide lines, pin one 2'' square on the top right corner of one 3'' x 5½'' rectangle, and pin one 1½'' square on the bottom left corner on the same 3'' x 5½'' rectangle. Then sew on the guidelines as shown in the diagram.
- Trim ¼'' seam allowances to the outside of the sewn lines. Press the seams open or to the dark side to create a Peek unit.
- Repeat Steps 2b and 2c to create a total of 128 Peek units for baby size quilt, and 336 Peek units for throw size quilt.
- Piecing Quilt Top
- Basting and Quilting
- Before any of the basting happens, prepare the quilt back. For the baby and throw size quilts, fold the backing fabric in half lengthwise and use a pair of fabric scissors to cut.
-
A quilt back needs to be large enough to cover the quilt top with approximately 4" overhang on each side (see photo in step 4c for example).
- Adjust seam allowance from allowance from ¼'' to ½'' and sew together quilt back. The adjustment to the seam allowance will help to strengthen the quilt long-term. And press the seams open to reduce seam bulk.
- Place quilt back right side down on your basting surface, followed by batting and the quilt top wrong side touching the batting. Spray or pin baste the three layers, and quilt as desired.
- Once all quilting is complete, with a long quilting ruler and rotary cutter, square and trim off excess fabric and batting. Quilt should measure approx.: baby size (40" x 40") and throw size (60" x 70").
- Binding and Finishing
- From the binding fabric, cut the following number of 2½" x WOF strips for binding:
- Join each of the strips at the shorter ends to create one long continuous strip to wrap around the edge of the quilt. At each joint, press the seams open to reduce seam bulk.
- Then fold and press the strip lengthwise to create binding strip.
- Line up raw edges of binding with quilt. Sew ¼" away from the raw edge.
- Fold binding over to the other side of the quilt, Machine or whipstitch the binding to complete the quilt. For this tutorial, I have machine binded the binding on the front of the quilt with the built-in decorative serpentine stitch on my BQ3100. If you’d like to replicate this example, the decorative stitch ID is 11-34, 7.0 stitch width and 1.4 stitch length.
Iron all fabrics before cutting and remove selvedges. Cutting dimensions include ¼'' seam allowances.
For the cutting directions I have included two options depending on whether you are digging deep into your scrap stash or working with yardage.
Quilt Size (finished size) |
Background Fabric (Fabric A) |
Peeks Fabric (Fabric B) |
Baby (40" x 40") |
Scrappy: 128 rectangles, 3'' x 5½'' Yardage: 19 strips, 3'' x WOF. Sub-cut: 128 rectangles, 3'' x 5½'' |
Scrappy: 128 squares, 2'' 128 squares, 1½'' Yardage: 7 strips, 2'' x WOF. Sub-cut: 128 squares, 2'' 25 squares, 1½'' 4 strips, 1½'' x WOF. Sub-cut: 103 squares, 1½'' |
Throw (60" x 70") |
Scrappy: 336 rectangles, 3'' x 5½'' Yardage: 48 strips, 3'' x WOF. Sub-cut: 336 rectangles, 3'' x 5½'' |
Scrappy: 336 squares, 2'' 336 squares, 1½'' Yardage: 16 strips, 2'' x WOF. Sub-cut: 336 squares, 2'' 12 strips, 1½'' x WOF. Sub-cut: 336 squares, 1½'' |
The following steps apply to both quilt sizes unless specified.
If using the Sew Straight™ Laser Vision Guide, pin the squares into position as outlined in the previous paragraph. Referring to the photo below, use the laser guide to identify the diagonal guidelines and then sew the two squares into place.
Tip: When piecing, it is natural to focus on the sewing machine needle. If you’re new to piecing with the laser guide, you need to retrain your brain to focus on where the laser guide is pointing at. If not, you may end up with wonky lines and inaccurate piecing. Thereby, my tip is don’t let the laser guide leave the point you want to end at (refer to where the finger is pointing in the photo above, on the right).
To construct the quilt top, sew 8 rows of 16 Peek units for Baby Sized Quilt and sew 14 rows of 24 Peek units for Throw Size Quilt. Press the seams open or to the dark side as you go.
Tip: For ease and organization, tackle the Blocks in rows. Then sew the rows together.
Basting in quilting means to temporarily secure the three layers of the quilt – top, batting and back – while permanent decorative stitches are incorporated.
Another alternative option is to completely skip this section and send your quilt to a longarm quilter. Choosing the longarm quilter route is the easiest, especially for larger quilts like the throw size. However, this service is an additional cost and depending on the longarm quilter’s workload, it requires additional time to complete the project.
There are a couple of ways to attach binding on to a quilt – machine and hand bind. For this particular tutorial, machine binding will be shown. This is the fastest method when it comes to binding.
Baby | 5 |
Throw | 7 |
Alternatively, if you want to continue the scrappy look into the binding, ensure joined binding strips (this will be carried out in the following step) are 2½" wide and measures at least 172" long for baby quilt and at least 272" long for throw size quilt.
And here you have it, another scrappy quilt project to add to your list of things to create. Be sure to share your Peekaboo Scrap quilt project by tagging @the.weekendquilter @BrotherSews #TheWeekendQuilte #BrotherSews #PeekabooScrapQuilt on social media.