Adding lights to a quilt - free tutorial

Hi everyone...it's Kat from  Calico Cali Designs. Today I'm writing about adding lights to your quilt. Yes you read that right...lights, as in small holiday type lights. I think lights are a great, unexpected addition to any quilted wall hanging. They add a whole other layer of dimension AND they don't have to be just for the Christmas season. Did I mention it's also very easy to do? Read below for all of the details. Happy Quilting!

Quilted wall hanging with lights

The first step in adding lights to a quilt is to sew eyelets onto the quilt where you want the lights to go. Count how many bulbs are in your strand of lights, and that's how many eyelets you will need to stitch. On my machine I have can vary the size of the eyelet stitch, and I found that a 7mm eyelet is just perfect. For my witch hat wall hanging, I used an embroidery design that had eyelets as part of the design. I wasn't able to control the placement of the eyelets, but I couldn't resist the fun hat!

7mm eyelet holes

Sew the eyelets onto your quilt top, then make your quilt sandwich, quilt it, (add a hanging sleeve), bind it and then you are ready to cut out the holes for the lights.

To cut the holes you will need a grommet/eyelet hole punch kit. (Mine came as part of a button hole kit).  The kit comes with the punch tool and a small mat.

Eyelet hole punch kit

 Place the mat underneath the quilt, directly under the eyelet hole that is to be cut. Line up your punch tool on the top of the quilt, and tap it with a hammer.

Cutting the holes

 Remember you are cutting through 2 layers of fabric and a layer of batting so you will need to tap with a little bit of force. Not as much as if you were hammering in a nail, but a gentle tap just won't cut through all of the layers.

Eyelets with holes cut out

As you cutting out the holes, use a pin to clear away the debris from inside the tool. If it gets too clogged up, it will not cut through all of the layers.

Clean the tool

Once you have all of the holes cut, add fray check to the back of the quilt around the holes. Once the fray check has dried, it's time to add the lights.

Be sure to use fray check on the back

 I used Flora-Lites. They are battery operated "ornamental" lights. There are 10 bulbs to strand. Even though the package says 'clear' lights, they do have more of a yellow tint to them.

Lights that I used

Open package of lights

Untangle and lay your lights out on the back of the quilt with the control box at the bottom of the area where the lights are to be placed.

Untangle the lights

Push the bulbs through each hole. You will need to use a little bit of pressure to get the lights to slide through the holes. But remember fabric stretches so they will fit.

Push lights through the holes 

Back of quilt.

Once all the lights are in..the back will look like this. Next step is to flip the quilt over to the top side and push the fabric down around each light.

Push fabric down around lights

Next, add the small black rubber O-rings. Push one O-ring down around each bulb. The O-rings ensure that the bulbs stay in place. However they are easy to remove if you wanted to take the lights out of the quilt for washing.

O-rings

This is what the bulbs look like once the O-rings are on.

O-rings in place

 Now that the lights are in place there's just one more step, securing the control box to the back of the quilt. The control box on this set of lights came with a velcro strip glued to it. The other side of the velcro is sticky. Remove the paper backing and adhere it to the quilt.

Control box with sticky velcro

 Tip:  I have found that the sticky velcro doesn't stick to the quilt very well, and over time the box just hangs there. It's not heavy enough to tug on the lights and remove them, but if your wall hanging is going to be on a door (that opens and closes a lot) then I would suggest using some carefully placed hand stitches to secure that velcro in place.

And now the moment you've been waiting for!! Turn the lights on, hang your quilt and enjoy!!

Finished quilt