Simple Square Quilt Patterns is a tutorial to make two of the most well know quilt patterns, beginners and advanced quilters love to make on their quilts.
When looking for an easy pattern to make your next quilt, you won’t have any problem to find the Trip Around The World or the Postage Stamps pattern, both are made with simple squares of fabric, both are easy to work on the piecing of the top and they will be quilted fast.
On this tutorial, I will share the easy steps to follow to make a block for the Sampler Quilt 2021 with each one of these Quilt Patterns, as both are made with squares of fabric, but at the time to work on the piecing, each pattern has it’s own design and each pattern pieces are cut in a different size.
Simple Square Quilt Patterns
Trip Around The World Step Quilt Pattern
This Quilt Pattern is a classic pattern that is made with uniform squares. If you’re looking to make a small project you will need to cut the squares in a small size, but if you’re looking to make a regular size quilt, you might need to cut the squares bigger or add more rows to the pattern.
On this tutorial, I will share the steps to work on to make a block 10 x 10 inches for the Sampler Quilt 2021
You will need:
All squares for this tutorial should be 2 1/2 x 2 1/2 inches.
- 1 square from fabric A – Center
- 4 squares from fabric B – Green and white fabric
- 8 Squares from fabric C – two tones of green
- 8 squares from fabric D – Blue and white fabric
- 4 squares from fabric E – Navy blue and white (corners)
- 1 piece of fabric for the back of 11 x 11 inches
- 1 piece of batting fabric of 11 x 11 inches (optional)
1 – How To Make A Trip Around The World Block
Arrange on your work table all the fabric squares to make this block, follow the layout on the image below.
Pinch a pin between each two squares, and pinch the squares one to the rest on each row.
Stitch on all the squares on each row by hand or with your sewing machine, press.
2 – How To Stitch On The Strips To Make A Trip Around The World Block
You can stitch a piece of painter’s tape where you can mark down each row number, this step will help you to keep all the strips in the right order while you work on the making of this block.
Stitch on strip # 1 to strip # 2, open and press.
Stitch on strip #3 to strip #2, open and press, continue stitching on the strips #4 and #5. Press the block when you finish.
3 – How To Make The Quilting Sandwich
When making the quilting sandwich for the block Trip Around The World, lay on your work table the fabric for the back with the pretty side down, lay over it the finished block.
In case you’re making the Sampler Quilt with batting fabric, put the batting fabric between the two layers of fabric.
Pinch enough safety pins to hold the 2 (3) layers of fabric while you work on the quilting, it can be done by hand or with Free Motion Quilting.
4 – How To Trim The Trip Around The World Block
Once you finish the quilting on this block, remove all the safety pins, check the measure of your block, it should be 10 x 10 inches, in case your block is bigger you can trim it with the help of a rotary cutter, a patchwork ruler and the cutting mat.
Postage Stamp Quilt Pattern
The Postage Stamp Quilt Pattern is another pattern to make with uniform squares of fabric, but the main characteristic on this pattern is the size of the squares of fabric, they should be small.
This pattern can be work by hand or with your sewing machine as well, and both ways are OK and you can get great results no matter which way to stitch them on.
Many quilters will work on this pattern on a classic way, cut out all the squares of fabric and then stitch on all the squares to make a block.
On this patchwork tutorial, I will share a different way to make it, by stitching on strips of fabric and then cut out strips, that will be later stitched on to make small blocks to make later a bigger block.
1 – Cut All Your Fabrics
Cut strips of fabric from your stash of 1 1/2 inches (wide) and try to cut strips long as 5 to 7 inches.
Stitch on 5 strips together, as its shown on the image below, press each piece.
Cut out strips of 1 1/2 inches wide from each piece you stitched on. Press
For this tutorial you will need 20 strips of 5 fabrics, 1/2 inch. Bottom left corner on the image below.
2 – How To Stitch On Small Postage Stamp Blocks
Make 4 groups of 5 strips of fabric, and stitch on each strip to the rest on each group, you will get 4 small blocks, press.
Stitch on two small blocks to make one half of the block for this tutorial, press.
Stitch on the two halves together to make the 10 x 10 inches block for this tutorial. Press.
3 – How To Make The Quilting Sandwich For The Postage Stamp Block
Once you get the block like its shown on the image below, lay on your work table the fabric for the back (11 x 11 inches), pretty side down, lay over it the finished block, pretty side up, in case your making the Sampler Quilt 2021 with batting fabric, its time to put it between these two layers of fabric, the fabric for the back and the top of the block.
Pinch enough safety pins to hold the 2 (3) layers of fabric together while you work on the quilting.
The quilting can be done by hand or with free motion quilting.
4 – How To Finish The Postage Stamps Block
Once you finish to work on the quilting, remove all safety pins and check the measure of your finished block, it might be bigger than 10 x 10 inches.
Trim the block to 10 x 10 inches.
The Postage Stamp Block is finished and it looks great!
Simple Square Quilt Patterns – Closing Thoughts
I hope you enjoyed working on these two Simple Square Quilts Pattern blocks for the Sampler Quilt as much as I did.
Whether you’re a beginner or an advanced quilter, is always nice to work on the classic quilting patterns that involve only uniform squares.
Some quilters might prefer to make one pattern to the other, as each one has its own pros and cons of making them, so let’s take a look to what are the pros and cons of each method of making these quilting patterns.
Trip Around The World Quilting Pattern, Pros and Cons
Pros
- A quilt is made with one pattern, uniform squares
- Suares of fabric can be cut any size.
- Classic quilting pattern good for beginners and more advanced quilters.
- Easy to cut all the pieces of fabric and stitch on to make the quilt.
- Quilts made with this pattern are classic and beautiful!
Cons
- It’s so easy to make this quilting pattern, that you can find quilts made with it anywhere.
- This pattern can be not the best for an advanced quilter who like the sewing and quilting challenges.
The Postage Stamp Quilt Pattern Pros and Cons
Pros
- The perfect quilting pattern to use all those small scraps of fabric.
- It can be made by hand or with your sewing machine.
- It’s made with a uniform square pattern.
- It can be made with the classic method by stitching on each square of fabric, or it can be made by stitching on strips of fabric to make small blocks that later can be stitching on to make the quilt top.
Cons
- The fabric squares should be cut always in a small size.
- Working on a quilt using this quilting pattern can take weeks, months and even years to finish it.
Simple Square Quilt Patterns, Which One Is Your Favorite?
Whether you like more one to the other, its always good to learn how each Quilting pattern is made!
I hope you enjoy as much as I did, while working on these two quilting tutorials to make two new blocks for the Sampler Quilt 2021.
These two new blocks are #8 and #9, and the Sampler Quilt starts to look pretty!
Thanks so much for your interest to make the Sampler Quilt along with me!
Puedes leer el mismo tutorial Patchwork en espanol en el blog de Ale Cose y Cose, Bloques Patchwork Con Cuadros.
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You can read more Patchwork, Quilting and Embroidery Tutorials here:
- Sampler Quilt 2021 –
- Bargello Quilt Block Pattern –