Description and pictures of the picnic rag quilt I recently made.

I’ve been wanting a picnic quilt for a long time. You know, the kind you can just leave in the van and pull out when you want to sit on the ground. It needed to be big enough for our whole family, so that’s pretty big! And intimidating as far as making a quilt goes! I had made a rag quilt with both sides flannel for one of my son’s beds and thought that might be a good way to go. But I wanted it to be more durable since it would be out in the elements. Then I saw the ideas for using denim! I don’t know why I never thought of it before, but denim works perfectly for a rag quilt! I love the way it frayed.

I like this pin and someday will probably use my old jeans stash to piece together some squares and upcycle. But for this project I just bought some denim and cut big squares to be able to finish it quicker. The top side uses flannel. I didn’t purchase any more flannel, so the top isn’t as pretty as it would have been if I had planned it out. But I wanted to use up my scraps.

The squares are 10″ x 10″. The seam allowances are one inch, which makes each sewn square 8″ x 8″. The final dimensions of the quilt are 80″ x 96″. Here are two tips: use rag quilt scissors to cut the seams (they are spring loaded so you don’t have to keep opening and closing the scissors) and wash the quilt for the first time at a commercial laundromat (it produces SO much lint!). One other thing I did to save time was not to put any batting in it. It’s thick enough and certainly heavy enough. My younger kids can’t even carry it!

This is what the underneath looks like: