Teaching an 8 Year Old To Sew

My grandson, Gavin, has been asking me for a while now to teach him to sew.  He loves my quilts, he's always enjoyed playing with scraps on my design wall, and he has decided that it is time for him to make a quilt himself.  Since he is going to be 9 in a few weeks, and since I learned about that age, and especially since he was at Gramma's last week, I decided it was time, too!  So, today I am sharing a step by step "tutorial" of sorts on teaching children to sew.....my way!

First gather all your scraps in one place....

                                     

I have to confess. This basket doesn't contain all my scraps.      

I also have scraps here....

                                   

                                   

here..........

     

                                      

and even here!

(And don't tell anyone, but I might even be able to find a few more if I try.)

                        Now, for the next step.

Well, this is what happened next at my house.  It wasn't  exactly planned, but someone (two little rascals named Gavin and Aidan) really had some fun! (You can skip this step if you want!

I had Gavin practice on lined paper for a while with no thread in the needle just to get the basic idea. Then he started putting some scraps together.  He did great!!! (And I am being totally unbiased.)

                                                                               

 

We only had time for him to finish a single block, which he was so happy with that he wanted me to quilt it right then and make a tiny little quilt from it.  Instead it is hanging on Gramma's design wall waiting for our next sewing day.  And Gramma is really looking forward to that!