Quilting and Cheater Fabric

Panels are a fast and easy way to make a quilt and get a lot of personality at the same time.  They work for quilts of every type.

The quilt above, with its bright colors and whimsical animal prints, was made for a child.

Cheater fabric is fabric that is printed with a design that looks like it has been pieced.

Most quilters do not use cheater fabric on a regular basis, but it does have its uses. To the left is a piece of cheater fabric that has nothing but the maple leaf block.

I took this fabric, cut out some of the blocks, and added them to the border of an Autumn quilt I made with very large, frugal and speedy blocks.

Here is a tip on using these kind of blocks.  I wish I had used this tip on this quilt.

In order for the design on the block to stand out, you want to sew around the block.  In the case of this print, it would be the maple leaf.  However, once the quilt is pieced, unless you are using free motion quilting, you really can't quilt around the maple leaf design.

When I do a big quilt, I just finish it by stitching long straight lines.  However, what you can do is to do some quilting on the maple leaf before you attach it to the quilt. 

Just use a small piece of batting and some backing, and pre-quilt the leaf block.  When it is small, it is easy to turn and quilt around the design.

Then you can attach it to the rest of the quilt.  The squares will be thicker, but since they are suppose to be an accent to the quilt, it won't matter.  The maple leaves will be highlighted, yet you have not had to do any free motion quilting, or what would be an impossible task of highlighting them when the quilt was finished.

There are some beautiful panels and cheater fabric.  Use your creativity, and use this as another frugal tool to make beautiful and speedy quilts.