Tips & Hints

Classes

If the class allows beverages in the sewing area, take soda/water/juice in resealable bottles and keep them sealed between sips. If it gets knocked over - you’ll still scare yourself, but no lasting damage has been done to your fabric or the fabric of your tablemate(s)!

Fabric Selection

Do you get the shakes every time you try to select fabric for your next quilt? No need - if you can dress yourself and not be afraid to leave the house in the morning - you can select fabrics that coordinate! You are the only one who has to like your quilt, there are NO quilt police who will tell you “You didn’t do it right...”

Some ways to make fabric selection easier

Use a multicolor print that jumped off the shelves into your arms and cried, “Take me home!”. Match the rest of the fabrics you need to the colors in that focus fabric. Use the colored dots along the selvedges of some fabrics to make matching those colors easier. Sorry, this is hit and miss - some fabric manufacturers don’t realize how important those little dots are to quilters! There you go - no fail color coordination!

Magazines

Those small post-it bookmark flags are great for marking all those projects you want to do someday! Use the larger ones and label with the project name - no more looking through the whole stack for that one project.

Measure those templates before assuming their size is correct. While magazines and pattern designers go to great lengths to prevent mistakes, a minute checking measurements may save you $ and a trip to the fabric store to replace yardage. While a trip to the fabric store is always a good thing, $ should be spent on new fabrics, not replacing fabric that has been rendered unusable!

Pressing

Use a permanent fabric marker and ruler to draw a grid on your ironing board cover. Use the grid to keep blocks square while pressing and strip sets straight.

Set up your ironing board level with your sewing area and place at a right angle to the machine. If you have a swivel chair also - you’ve got it made! No more up and down sewing! Just remember to take a breather and stretch occasionally - maybe while you put something in the crock pot for dinner so you can keep sewing!

Projects

A 4x6 file box w/cards will make a great project file. I fill out my cards with the name, size and the source of the pattern, then list the colors/values and yardage needed. When I go shopping, I just take the card.

Quilt Photos

Want to show your quilts to your quilting email list, but worry about attachment phobia? Use one of the great, FREE photo sharing websites. Email the photo attachments to them and include the web address for your online photo album in your email automatic signature. Members of your list can go at their leisure and see all your wonderful quilts with no fear!

Rotary Cutting

To keep your ruler from swiveling as you cut WOF (width of fabric) strips - walk your fingers up the ruler as you rotary cut. Remember to stop the cutting hand while the fingers of the ruler hand are walking!

Check and if necessary, square the leading fabric edge after cutting each 4 - 5 strips to prevent bowed strips with V’s on the fold.

Sewing

When sewing strip sets, sew each new strip on, starting at the opposite end from where you began the last strip.

Molefoam, available in small pieces from the “Foot Care” section of the drugstore makes a great seam guide. I cut mine 1/4” x 2”. Place your rotary ruler under the needle and lower the presser foot. The needle should be on the right side of the 1/4” line. Peel off the backing and place the molefoam on the machine bed along the rotary ruler edge. The molefoam barrier keeps patches feeding through on the straight and narrow. Replace the molefoam as the guide edge deteriorates.

Stash

I use the large plastic bins and fold my fabric to fit in 2 rows, then “file” the fabric on end in color wheel fashion. “Compulsive,” you say? Sure - but when I want a pink fabric, I only have to open one bin to find all my choices there in front of me! I’ve done the same thing with fat quarters (4 rows) and in smaller bins - all my scraps.

Afraid of designated project fabrics getting lost in your stash? Use a plastic bin or lined cardboard drawer set and put the whole thing together - fabric and project card, ready for you when you feel the urge to start another UFO, or is that WIP?!

Tools of the Trade

Instead of shelling out more fabric $ than you need to - go to the hardware section and purchase a door peephole - they’re cheaper than pricey reducing glasses and work great!