Starting My Jelly Roll Rug

I got my jelly roll strips sewn end to end - all 40 strips @ 42" each. That's a 140 foot 2 1/2" wide strip of fabric. - 46.7 yd.

I'm using Fabulous Forties "Jolly Spring' fabrics. As much as I hate what rabbits do to my garden, they're really cute on this fabric.

There are also gnomes with ears

and gnomes riding rabbits.

When joining the strips, I lay them right sides together at 90 degrees to each other.

The green masking tape is making a straight line from the needle to the edge of the extender.

That way, I don't need to pin the pieces. I simply put the needle at the top edge where the two fabrics cross and the lower crossing along the tape.

After all the strips were joined, I trimmed the triangles to about 3/8". I started trying to trim with a rotary cutter but all the aligning was fiddly so I just cut the excess and ears with scissors. Then I opened the diagonal seams and pressed them open.

I then folded the strip back and forth onto itself, securing each end with rubber bands, and have it ready to sew with the pre-cut batting which I bought in a 50 yd wheel.  (pictured is a 25yd wheel but they also come in 50yd wheels).

You can also cut your own batting into strips and join them end to end with either batting tape or zig-zag stitches. With 96" wide batting 1.5 yards of batting are required. It's much easier to just use the pre-cut batting. I have noted that the pictured batting wheel is 2 1/2" wide. The 50yd wheel that I have is only 2 1/4" wide. This should make it a bit easier to fold it inside the fabric strip.

to be continued...