A beginner's guide to quilting

There is nothing like snuggling with a cozy quilt on a cold winter's day. The following steps will help you chose a quilt design and learn how to put your quilt together.

Decorative quilting looks best when used on plain borders or large spaces within blocks. Designs range from elaborate feathers or scrolls to simple straight-line grids. For more elaborate patterns, select one of the special design stencils that are available from any patchwork supply shop.

• Mark the quilt top with any quilting lines or designs before sandwiching it with the wadding and backing.
• You can mark it with a lead pencil, a chalk dispenser or a special pen using water-soluble ink.
• Test the marking pen on a scrap of the fabric before marking a quilt top.

Wadding and backing are usually cut a bit larger than the quilt top. You may need to join lengths of fabric together to make the backing wide enough. Try to avoid having a centre seam. For example, use a full fabric width down the centre of the backing and partial widths on either side to make up the desired width. Press the backing to remove wrinkles.

Assemble the quilt by spreading the backing, wrong side up, on a clean floor or large table, and lay the wadding on top of it.

1. Place the patchwork top over the wadding, right side up. Again smooth out wrinkles.
2. Then tack (baste) the three layers together using a square grid.
3. When you are machine quilting, anchor the three layers together every 10 centimetres (four inches) with some medium-size safety pins, available from quilting supply shops. Do not use safety pins if you hand quilt, as pins may mark your fabric over time.
4. To hand quilt, place the quilt in a circular or square quilting frame with the three layers taut but not drum tight.
5. Thread the needle with quilting thread about 45 centimetres (18 inches) long.
6. Insert the needle from the top, and gently tug the thread so that the knot pops through the top layer and lodges in the wadding. Use small, even running stitches.
7. Finish off a line of quilting with a knot and take it down into the wadding.
8. Cut the thread near the top.
9. To machine quilt, roll the excess quilt on either side and secure with bicycle clips, if necessary.
10. Feed the quilt through as evenly as possible; a walking foot on your machine helps.
11. When you first begin to machine quilt, use a simple straight line pattern.