3rd grade classroom quilt

My sister wants to make a quilt for her daughter-in-law the 3rd grade
teacher's classroom wall. Suggestions?

Trixie

How about tracing each child's hands in a muslin square and letting
them decorate it with fabric markers. They could then be incorporated
into a final quilt in lots of different ways.

Diana - PA

On Sep 25, 10:40*pm, "Trixie" wrote:
My sister wants to make a quilt for her daughter-in-law the 3rd grade
teacher's classroom wall. Suggestions?

Trixie

Noah's Ark: Different animals around or below the Ark. They could
use fabric crayons on calico and some BIG stitiches for embellishment
(or not). Buttons for eyes go well.

My House: Then put the houses on a street, or in a town or round the
school.

People who help us: A fireman, doctor, nurse, teacher, policeman etc,
etc. A border of hands.

People around the world: Loads of costumes collaged onto a basic set
of 'persons' maybe a girl and boy of each costume. This is good if
you have a good ethnic mix in the class, too.

A theme from the reading scheme. I'm not up to date with the ones
used, especially over there, but there is usually something that can
be gleaned from the books.

Above all. Ask the teacher. She/he will have some ideas based on
what is going on, or would be appropriate.

Enjoy!
Nel
(GQ)

We did a class quilt that depicted our local history, which is what we
were studying. I bought fabric markers and crayons from Dharma
Trading.

On Sat, 25 Sep 2010 19:40:02 -0700, "Trixie" wrote:

My sister wants to make a quilt for her daughter-in-law the 3rd grade
teacher's classroom wall. Suggestions?

Trixie

One interesting thing I have seen for quilts involving kids is making
a quilt in which each child makes a block -- not as difficult as you
might think, by the way! You cut blocks of white fabric, one for each
child. The size can be anything, but should be large enough for the
child to draw a picture. Now, here comes a waste of fabric, but bear
with me -- since you will be taping the fabric to cardboard, you need
the block to be at larger all the way around than you want the
finished block to be, so if you want 10" for the final block, cut your
fabric blocks about 12". Now, take some ordinary masking tape and
tape each block to a piece of cardboard, taping all the way around
and making sure the fabric is smooth. (Or you could staple it to the
cardboard. Whatever is handy.) Take a pencil and mark the seam lines.
Now, take an ordinary crayon and mark a heavy "frame" around the edge,
about 1/4" to 1" from where your seam line will be. (You want the
crayon frame to show!) You can use one color, two colors, or any
combination of colors, but all should be bright, strong colors. Now
it's time for the kids, so get out lots of crayons, and have each
child draw a picture or make a design on his block. Pressing the
crayons "hard" makes a better picture. When the kids are finished,
leave the blocks taped to the cardboard, get out some paper bags to
use as "pressing cloths" and iron each block on high heat setting to
melt the color into the fabric. The cardboard and paper bags will
protect your ironing board and your iron. Trim the blocks leaving a
seam allowance, assemble your quilt top, and then you are ready to
assemble and quilt. Or, simply add something for an edging and then
hang it on the wall without making an actual quilt. Depending on the
number of kids, you may need to add some blocks -- name of school,
name of teacher, school mascot, dates, names of kids, etc.

One thing -- before you buy fabric, cut up a lot of good cardboard
boxes, etc., you really should make a block or two at home to try out
the technique! And you will have something to show the kids so they
have an idea about the actual quilt they will be making blocks for.
But this technique really does work! It's a lot of work getting
everything prepped, and work assembling and finishing, but the kids
have fun, and the finished product is a great display in the
classroom.

Does she want to make the whole quilt or involve the class? (Warning:
involving the whole class may turn into an every year project!! Each
class will want their own quilt.)

For a class room quilt that carries through there are lots of options.
For "just" decoration an old time (or newer) schoolhouse block quilt
comes to mind.
There are probably some traditional block names that might relate to
school. Those blocks could be combined in a sampler.
Applique ideas should be all over the place..... coloring books or
work sheets come to mind.
Or blocks representing the curriculum of her school and year. Or just
curriculum in general since she might end up teaching another grade
level at some point. ( Math: numbers and symbols, or a basic math
problem worked out. Reading: books. Writing: letters, both block and
cursive?? Geography: a globe, or outline of the state/US. History: an
image representing something from local history. and so on. )

Eleanor Burns also has a classroom/teacher oriented "Quilt in a Day"
book, "It's Elementary" (Or something with elementry in it. sigh)

Hope this helps.
Pati, in Phx



On Sep 25, 7:40*pm, "Trixie" wrote:
My sister wants to make a quilt for her daughter-in-law the 3rd grade
teacher's classroom wall. Suggestions?

Trixie

Thank you everyone for the excellent suggestions!

Trixie

"Trixie" wrote in message
...
My sister wants to make a quilt for her daughter-in-law the 3rd grade
teacher's classroom wall. Suggestions?

Trixie

http://www.hgtv.com/crafting/crayon-quilts/index.html
just saw a rerun of this method on Simply Quilts.
could be made either with or without the kids help.
should appeal to them either way.
using words appropriate to the class/school/ teacher but with few letters
was the suggestion.
i liked the texture added. so many places to find good textures. she used at
least 3 on each block.
she 'pen stitched' round each pix on that design but other quilts of the
same type were shown where she had used several strands of embroidery black
thread and did big stitching round them as the quilting design itself.
get simple pix from kids colouring books, on or offline books.
no wonder that is why there are so many crayon colours available.
fwiw,
j.


"Trixie" wrote ...
My sister wants to make a quilt for her daughter-in-law the 3rd grade
teacher's classroom wall. Suggestions?

Trixie