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Initially I planned to do something like a traditional alphabet quilt with each letter of the alphabet making up an individual block and sashing in-between.

Then it struck me that I could make a quilt which looked like a cross-stitch sampler. Long ago, I tried to cross-stitch one of those for myself. I stitched the letter A in royal purple, or at least stitched most of it. Then I got bored, hated the counting, and tossed the whole thing aside. So here was another chance to make myself a sampler.

I had a gorgeous 2-yard piece of hand-dyed fabric which I had never worked up the nerve to cut into. I decided the fabric – which wasn’t just purple but also pink and blue – would be stunning set against black and that the variations in the fabric would help give each character its own look, while allowing me to only cut about three strips to get started. The hand-dye also had the advantage, as did the solid black, of being completely reversible.

I started at A and worked my way through the alphabet, working on about three letters at a time. (In a classic do-as-I-say-not-as-I-do fashion, I recommend strongly that you don’t follow my example and instead work on the easiest letters first if you’re trying this technique out.) I used every letter and number I created even when I wasn’t thrilled with it (the W in particular comes to mind). As I went along, I freely made the letters and numbers without worrying about what size they were and without adding any of the background fabric around them.

Having said that, I only had a height variance in the units of about 2”. I expect that if I had made characters with just the skinniest strips and then made others with just the widest, I would have had more of a discrepancy. As it was, didn’t have a problem.

After all the units (the letters and the numbers) were together I started fiddling with them to figure out how many could go on a line. I put the zero at the end of the alphabet and split up my last name, an effect I quite like, and which you may have noticed in my recently pieced bed quilt.

For each line, I figured out what was the best height for the characters to be. Now knowing what a pain in the patootie that is, I make all the characters in a quilt the same finished height. It just saves on aggravation, but probably lessens the character of the quilt. It’s a sacrifice this lazy gal is willing to make.

Some letters had to be cut down; others needed background added to make them taller. After that step, I added a narrow strip to the right of every unit (except the last on the line) – otherwise they’d all be jammed up against one another. Then joined all the characters on each line, and sewed a narrow strip between the lines. Not that you need to know all the gory details, so I'll stop babbling now.

Star Light and fabric choice

This is Star Light, the next quilt I made after the Alphabet Sampler. In this quilt I practised making small letters (as in non-capitals, not tiny) and used a different style of M and W - they look like knocked over capital E's and don't have angles. I don't like the effect nearly as well as when there are angles, but this method is easier.

I throw this quilt in here to illustrate a point about choosing fabric. The letters are scrappy, the background consistent. Consistent, but busy. It makes it hard to read the letters. It's not a disaster in this quilt, because the saying is well known, and there is an icy, starry quality to the whole thing: it shimmers and blinks.
But is that an effect you want in your project?

So unless you are being deliberately obscure, choose letter/number fabric(s) that contrast well with the background.

My recommendation is that you use just one fairly solid looking fabric for either the characters OR for the background.

Improvisational "Rules"

Things to keep in mind:

You are doing this to have FUN

The improvisational method has two important “rules”

If it's too long, cut it off.

If it's too short, add to it.

While working with small pieces, it's no big deal to cut with scissors. But once the units get a bit bigger I do recommend switching to a rotary cutter and ruler.

I attach pieces and pieced sections of fabric to strips (and then whack off the extra length of the strip) because it is really easy. But you can always use a scrap instead.

During the early phases of construction, there is no proper size. Nothing has to be just right. Add or subtract, it doesn't matter.

A consistent 1/4" seam allowance is completely unneccessary; however do try for a straight seam. Do keep in mind the use of the quilt - if it's going on the wall then a narrow seam won't be a big deal. If it's going to be a lap, bed, or crib quilt then closer to 1/4" the better. You can always cut down a seam allowance that is bigger than a 1/4" if you are going to be hand quilting.

It isn't necessary to use an iron while working on the units (that's what I call the letters and numbers before they are finished to their final size, when I then start calling them blocks). If you want to, knock yourself out. Once you are trying to make things a certain size, then it matters and pressing with an iron is important.

You're making folk art! Forget about perfection!

I'm starting with the capital letters, moving from the easiest letters to the hardest. I'll provide dimensions just to give you some place to start. The letters will come out to roughly 3" or 4".

The first cut I take out of my fabric is usually about 2" from the edge. I don't want to waste a bit of it. This first piece usually gets cut into quarters and sometimes even smaller so that all the edges are straight. I only cut off frayed bits (or the nasty white lines you can get sometimes with torn fabric).

Cut several strips of varying widths from each fabric. Try to do this without measuring too much: a consistent size throughout the strip isn't a biggie. I am the queen of the V-cut strip, I assure you. Just cut the strip in half, or quarters if necessary, so that you're not trying to sew with a strip that has a peak or dip in it.

In fact, you may want to make deliberately angled cuts. I like the look myself. The two red strips at the end are angled cuts running from something like 3/4" at their narrowest to 2"-ish at their widest.

The widest strip should be cut roughly between 1 1/2" and 2", and the skinniest about 7/8" to 3/4", and another strip somewhere in between. You can cut more than three different width strips if you want to.

If you look at my first sampler quilt, I think the widest strip I cut was about 1 1/2" - I didn't start using wider strips until later quilts. If you want your letters to be more consistent, then go for the narrower size. For the red and white sampler I'm working on, I want to have really wide and then really narrow sections of the letter, plus the occasional inbetween, so I'm not going wild with intermediate sized strips. For the big bed quilt I had a range of letter strips that graduated in size by 1/8" plus several angled cuts

To make the T, cut a chunk of letter fabric about 2" long and sew it lengthwise to a background fabric strip. Cut the strip so that it is even with the letter fabric. I've illustrated this with a rotary cutter ruler, but I use scissors.

Always whack off any extra so that the longer bit is even with the shorter bit. This cut can be an angle, it just has to be relatively straight.

Now add this pieced bit to another strip of background fabric, with the letter fabric in the middle. Then whack it even.

Follow the same procedure for the I, keeping in mind that the middle section will need to be a bit narrower than the one you made for the T. I don't want things to always be consistent, so on my I, I've added more background fabric on one side than on the other.

Finish the T by sewing this unit onto a letter fabric. Do that and then do that again for making an I.

An H is made exactly the same as an I, but I wanted to show an alternate method for making it, using strip insertion. If you don't want to play with angles, you don't have to.

For this one cut a section of background fabric about 3" long. In roughly the middle, make an angled cut. You're going to sew the strip in between those two sections. You'll see that I have the letter strip placed closer to the lower half, beginning on the left side and that the letter strip angles OUT from the sections. When pieced, there will be extra sticking out. If I were to sew from another spot, I might end up with the letter fabric angling in, meaning I'd have to seam rip OR make the unit narrower.

Sew the letter strip in between the background strips, then even up the edges on both sides. Then to add the next bit of background fabric, you must give yourself a 1/4" overlap at the top (as in 3rd picture above) so that when you open it up, the angled edge will open up straight. If you do it wrong, you'll immediately understand what I mean. Sometimes doing it wrong (several times) is the way to finally learn that lesson. It's not like the world is going to end. You can whack something off at an angle. It should look something like the second pic above when you attach it.