Quilt Along Week 2 Cutting the Fabric for you Quilt

**Contest to win the Rowenta iron is over. Thanks to everyone who entered!

Week 2 means we have our fabric and supplies and are ready to start cutting the fabric. You gotta cut the fabric so that you have the pieces and parts you need ready to assemble quilt blocks.

You need an iron, cutting mat, rotary cutter, ruler/straight edge and fabric.

And with that I'm out. See you again next week for another installment . . .

Just kidding.




First thing you need to do is iron all of your fabric. You are aiming for nice straight cuts and nothing ruins that faster than folds, lumps and bumps in your fabric. Use a hot iron and press it all.


Ok. So here is one of my fabrics. Remember we have 1/2 yard cuts of 12 different fabrics. I have one laying out on my table. The selvages are on the east and west sides.




Fold your fabric selvage to selvage. Line the selvages up together the best that you can.



Now fold it again. And line that fold up along with the selvages as best that you can too.



Now. Rotate your fabric so that now the selvage edge is in the north position. The frayed cut edges are now in the east west position.




You want an nice, smooth, straight edge to work with so using your cutting mat as a guide, position your fabric so that you can cut that edge and even all the layers of fabric up.




Voila!




Now you are going to cut 2 1/2 inch strips of fabric. All of it. Ready. Set. Go!









After you have cut a strip you can unfold it and see that it is 2 1/2 inches by the width of the fabric (generally 45 inches). Anyhow, do the whole bit of fabric there into 2 1/2 inch strips. For this particular 1/2 yard, I got 7 strips. But that might not always be the case.

Take a deep cleansing breath. ::Ahhhhhhh::

You can do this.




After all the strips have been cut from an individual fabric you will be left with your stack of strips and little bits of scrap. Just stack up the strips and move on to the next 1/2 yard of fabric.

Rinse and repeat.




Remember earlier I said that I got 7 strips from that particular fabric? And remember I said that that wouldn't necessarily always be the case? Well, look here. When I folded my fabric selvage to selvage, the cut edges were farther apart. As a result, I had to cut more of the actual fabric in order to get those to line up. So, I ended up only getting 6 strips of this one instead of 7.

No biggie.

I've read the the book Don't Sweat the Small Stuff. And this is small stuff. So don't sweat it.






Continue this cutting process until you have cut all of your 12 1/2 yard cuts of fabric. Leave your binding fabric for later. We will do that during the binding portion of our quilt along.




Now you should have a pretty stack of 2 1/2 inch width strips.

How about a giveaway?

I bought a new iron a few weeks ago. I love it so much I thought you might like one too.



This Rowenta iron is made specially for crafters and my life hasn't been the same since I've had it.



If you'd like a shot at winning it leave me a comment here. You have until 7:00pm EDST US on Wednesday, May 27, 2009. And if you haven't joined the Flickr group yet, well . . . what is your deal? That is a great place to ask questions and find answers to all things related to this quilt along event.

Happy Memorial Day. And to my husband, Razor, it has been the best 13 years of my life. I look forward to many, many more.

-dana