101 Handmade Days: DIY Picnic Quilt

There are few ways I like to spend  a relaxing afternoon that a little picnic in my backyard. All I need is a snack, some water, a good book, my dog and a picnic quilt and I’ll be out there for hours! Of course if its been raining lately, the picnic quilt can end up getting damp… which is annoying. So I decided to make my own DIY Picnic Quilt and add a little water resistance to the bottom!

Remember a few weeks ago when I shared about my Bandanna Quilt? This one is the same principle and uses a lot of the same steps, plus its super easy!

You’ll need:

Water resistant table cloth
Quilt batting (at least 65 inches wide)
“cheater” quilt fabric ( this is fabric where the print looks like a quilt, but there is no sewing involved)
Thread
Sewing Machine
Iron
Scissors
Large Quilting Safety Pins

Base your fabric measurements/needs off of the size of your table cloth.

Iron your top “Cheater” fabric. Clear a large space on the floor to layer and sandwich your quilt

Start  by laying your batting flat on the floor. Then spread your cheater quilt top on top of the batting. Smooth all the wrinkles out. Take your backing fabric and lay it right side down (if its patterned you want the right side of the fabric facing the right side of the “cheater” quilt top). Again, smooth all the wrinkles out and make sure that all the layers are flat. Pin all three layers of your quilt together. Don’t be afraid to use lots of pins to secure the layers.

Carefully trim any access batting and backing fabric.

Sew a 1/2 seam through all 3 layers around the quilt. Leave a 10 to 12 inch gap between where you start and stop to turn your quilt right side out. Trim the corners.

**Make sure you have ALL your safety pins removed before turning. I missed one and it tore the table cloth a little.**

Turn your quilt and poke out the corners.

Iron your seams flat and carefully fold and iron the space where you turned the quilt

Top stitch 1/4 inch around the whole quilt. Bury in your threads.

As you can see, we’ve already been putting out DIY picnic quilt to good use! You could even say Bitly was a fan… thus the puppy photo bombing 😉