Apple Doll Quilt

Here’s the completed Apple Doll Quilt. It’s too small for an IKEA doll bed or to be used as a quilt for some of the popular 18 inch dolls. But it’s perfect for a small Waldorf doll or a Hazel Village doll or animal.

It’s the new Limited Edition visiting Hazel Village animal, Clara Otter, who is relaxing under this little quilt. Her bed is a cardboard flat that originally was used to protect a case of canned dog food from dents during shipping. Not only is it comfy, but it’s perfect for Clara as the Hazel Village animals like to create things they need from other available items.

I designed the tiny tossed apple print fabric which was printed at Spoonflower.com a long time ago. The fabric isn’t currently available for purchase.

Notice: This blog is not monetized: I do not use affiliate links. When there are links in a post, they are to give credit to another creative person, because I like or have used a product, or to help the reader easily find supplies for a project.

Doll Quilt in Progress: From Trash to Treasure

I’ve been quilting for HOW long?? And still I made an avoidable error. I recently purchased a pattern. When I read the instructions for cutting the fabric and looked at the instructions I knew that there was serious error for cutting part of the pattern. I should have drawn the block in EQ8 and checked it, which is what I did…eventually…but instead I just went head and cut out the fabric as directed.

I thought I could wing it, or change some other parts of the pattern and make it work. I re-cut a lot of the pieces, but no. The half square triangles (HSTs) were never going to work.

I could have just tossed the lot, but years ago I designed the apple fabric and had it printed at Spoonflower. No way I was tossing it!

It didn’t take me long to figure it that the orphan patches would make a sweet doll quilt. I laid the HSTs out in lots of different patterns but finally decided I liked a simplest layout. I got it all sewed together and looked at it for a few days. Nice, but it could be better.

I couldn’t be believe I was doing this for a doll quilt, but I took off the borders to added an inner red strip. I made raised flange from a 1 1/8 inch strip of red fabric. I folded the strip in half the long way and pressed. Then I sewed it to the pieced blocks using a very scant 1/4 inch seam. And finally reattached the apple border using a full 1/4 inch seam.

Doll quilt sandwiched, basted and ready to quilt

I do like version #2 better, though there was really nothing wrong with version #1! It’s all sandwiched, using up a remnant of cotton quilt batting, and is ready to quilt.

The puppy had surgery two days ago, so this will have to wait. The pup is sore, but doing well, but I’ll doing quiet tasks to be near her until she’s feeling better.

Once the it’s quilted, I’m planning on adding red binding. A doll somewhere is going to be toasty wrapped in her quilt, maybe dreaming of making an apple pie for her little person!

Doll Quilt from a Spoonflower Swatch

I purchased this rabbit fabric as an 8 inch swatch of “Hare in the Meadow Small” by Jill O’Connor from Spoonflower.com. I had thought I was going to put in the “Urban Allotment” quilt in my March 31, 2022 post as one of the “unexpected visitors” but as it turned out, I’d already pieced the quilt by the time my order arrived.

Too cute to not be used, I decided that the swatch was just like a fabric quilt panel. I could easily make a doll size quilt by just adding borders to the swatch.

And it just so happened, I had some borders left over from a quilt top I had just completed. All I needed to do was to piece 4 more 9 patch cornerstones!

I love how this little project came together! It’s the perfect size for a Hazel Village rag doll. Hazel Village is best known for their forest animals but they do have a small collection of rag dolls. This is Louise, definitely my favorite of the bunch! Though Jules is really cute too!

I definitely would consider purchasing a Spoonflower swatch in the future, just to make a doll quilt.

More Ideas for Easy Quilts using Homemade Pre-Cut Fabrics

The pre-cut Charity Quilt project I discussed in the last 2 posts was so much fun that I pulled out my stash of Christmas fabrics to make a another quilt. I made this one for my dog* but it will be an example to show at the Guild meeting when there is a discussion about ways to use the fabrics that were pre-cut this past summer.

This quilt was made with just 10 x 5 inch bricks and 5 inch squares. There are an equal number of each block in each row. There is a narrow strip of fabric at each end of the quilt to give it some definition.  The back has a large print Christmas pattern, so this quilt is actually reversible.

Reverse of quilt at top

*The Christmas quilt I use on my bed has a red Irish Chain with white blocks. I'm going to put this quilt son top of that quilt for my quilt-loving Lab-mix to sleep on!  Hopefully this little quilt will keep my quilt clean!

On a roll, I made one more quilt--this one doll size. An Etsy company sent me four 5 inch charm squares of space fabrics as a bonus to my fabric order.  Making a doll quilt seemed like a perfect way to use those squares plus some of the bits and pieces in my stash.  
 

Micah, a Bamboletta Cuddle Doll, with the Space Doll Quilt, 16 x 19 inches

I decided to cut the 5 inch space fabric squares in half and use 2.5 inch squares from my stash.  Good thought but....what works in algebra doesn't work in quilty math!  I didn't put 2 and 2 together until I had sewn all the strips of blocks for the quilt long to discover that they weren't the same length. Right:  in quilting a 2.5 square + 2.5 square = 4.25 x 2.5 block, not a 5 x 2.5 inch block!

It was too late to cut down the 2.5 x 5 inch blocks so I just added a bit of fabric on alternating ends of each row, making it a scrappy improv Space quilt. Problem solved, but I did have a good laugh....How long have I been quilting???  Long enough, but even an experienced quilter can get tripped up by not checking the math before cutting! 

Micah suggling under the Space Doll Quilt

Pinwheel Modern Doll Quilt

This year the Proper Bostonian Quilters Guild has been working on a mystery quilt which is a sampler of star blocks.  There have been lots of stitch and flip patches in the blocks. Those stitch and flip units have "waste" triangle units which are really ready-made half square triangle blocks!

I decided to make those little triangles into a couple of doll quilts. Here is the first one. The little pinwheels finish at 2 inches square and the larger ones at 3 inches square.

It's quilted with Big Stitch Quilting using #8 Perle cotton thread and there are French knots in the pinwheels.  When I first started quilting and was using a lot of applique, I added details with embroidery. Now that embroidery is making a big come back, I can see using it, sparingly, to add a little pop to a quilt. I've been adding dots to lots of my drawings so I decided it would be fun to put some little dots in this doll quilt!

This is a little doll quilt--a size chosen to be used with my Baby Waldorf Doll. Doesn't Lucy Birch look comfy under the quilt?

I have enough left little half square triangles to make one more quilt about this size. The design is done and it's ready to sew, so I'll share it soon!

Modern Doll Quilt Completed

Here's my completed Modern Color Block Doll Quilt.

I've quilted it by hand with Big Stitch Quilting using Pearl Cotton thread.  Each row has white stitching and three rows have a second line of stitching using aqua thread.

Here's the back of the quilt.  The baby blue fabric with the tiny white polka dot is really sweet.

A big shout out to Jeannette T. for her assistance with this project!

Coming up in the next few weeks:  My newly designed Waldorf Style Doll.

Modern Doll Quilt Top

Having made 4 good size quilts in January, I decided my next project would be a small doll quilt! I was given a stack of 2 1/2 inch squares as part of a Yankee Swap over the holidays. And I had a few left over white 10 inch layer cake Kona®squares which I cut into 2 1/4 inch strips. The 2 1/2 inch squares were pinked so 2 1/4 inches was a better match.

I haven't picked a backing or binding yet but I know I'm going to quilt it with straight line quilting. It's a sweet little piece!

Doll Quilt--Lab Puppies

One last look at a Lab Puppies quilt.  This one is a doll quilt.   I incorporated the asymmetric borders from the lap quilt, but these blocks have a symmetric layout. It is quilted just off the ditch, with decorative stitching on the bottom border and the Bernina #4 stitch on the left side. 

The back is fleece, so there is no batting in this little project.  The binding was made of scraps of other quilt bindings--I think these scrappy bindings are my favorite!

1990 Silk Screened Quilt Blocks Finally Quilted

I've been really working on decluttering my house this year. Cleaning out drawers with craft supplies, I recently found a stack of rabbits which I had silk screened in 1990.  I printed the rabbit design on my Valentine cards that year.  But I thought the rabbit was really cute so I also silk screened a stack of quilt blocks.  So there they were, 25 years later, still waiting to be made into a quilt. 

The Proper Bostonian Quilters Guild had a UFO (Un-Finished Objects) Summer Challenge this year.  That was the perfect incentive to make these blocks into a mini quilt!  It measures 17.5 x 22 inches, a lovely size for a doll quilt.   The quilt is machine pieced and bound, but all the quilting was all done by hand.

The fabric on the back is a tiny apple design.  

I'm so happy I found my stack of rabbit blocks and finally put them to good use!