I am super excited to bring you my FIRST Quilt-A-Long. I just love this quilt, which I call The Rug Quilt. Why The Rug Quilt? Well its inspiration came from a hip rug in a very groovy Portland shop. I have put together many prizes for you to win, so let’s have some fun! How can you win one of these prizes? Share your progress on Instagram and tag me @brownbirddesigns using #theRugQuiltALong and #trqalweek2 (each week this one will change). The more weeks you participate, the greater your chance of winning. When I reveal the next step, I will announce a new winner here on my blog. The prizes will get larger as the quilt progresses, so stick around.

Today we are working on cutting strips and sewing them together to make larger strip sets. We will use 90” of colored fabric. Cut ten 3” strips of each color. My colors are lime, aqua, and magenta. We will use 99” of white fabric. Cut thirty-three 3” strips of white. (You can scrap up your white using four different whites. For blocks use 33″ of three different whites. For sashing, use 27″ of one different white.)

• Working with the same colored fabrics, sew together a white strip of fabric to a colored strip. I will start with aqua. For a total of 6. (two-strip set)
• Add a aqua strip to the raw edge of the aqua strip. For a total of 4. (three-strip set)

• Add a white strip to the aqua edge on a three-strip set. Locate a different three-strip set, flip it and sew the white edge to the aqua edge. This set is done.

• On a two-strip set, sew a white strip to a aqua strip. This set is done.
• On a two-strip set, sew a three-strip set attaching the aqua edges together. This set is done.

• Locate the last three-strip set. Sew a white strip to an aqua edge. Cut it in half. Cut a white strip in half. Sew the half white strip to the white edge in the now four-strip set. Sew the other half of the four-strip set to the white. This set is done. Note: You will have an extra white strip and a half white strip. Save them for later.
• Iron flat in the following sequence
  Press strip set 3 to the left.
  Press strip set 5 to the right.
  Press strip set 7 to the left.
  Press strip set 9 to the right.

Repeat all of these steps for your other colored fabric choices; ex. lime and magenta. At the end of this Quilt-A-Long I will show images on how you can use your scrap blocks to make another quilt as well as what a larger quilt would look like (using the scrap blocks for Jess’s wedding quilt). If you don’t want any scrap blocks and  want to make three blocks of one color instead of six blocks, send me a message and I will let you know how you can work with two fat quarters.

YOU CAN JUMP IN AT ANY TIME. THESE ARE THE PAST STEPS

SCHEDULE
PICKING YOUR FABRICS
CUTTING AND SEWING STRIPS 
MAKING YOUR BLOCKS
ADDING CAPS
ADDING SASHING
ADDING BOARDS

The winner of week 1 is @kaylynowns. Congratulations!!

This weeks prize is a Charm Pack, Aurifil embroidery thread and a sewing template.
Come back next Thursday and we start working on blocks.