The process - Tutitorial part 3

Before I get started on the tutitorial I thought I would show how close my daffodils are to opening. It is overcast, 43 degree, and raining today so I don't think they will be opening today. It has been a long winter and I am ready for some color in the yard.


Here is the completed quilt top. Now I am ready to trim it to size. What size? The size it comes out to be. I made sure that the top looked proportional in size - meaning the lenght of the top and the width look good together - that it wasn't too skinny or short in relation to the lenght or width. That is why I added the scrappy pieced area - the quilt would have come out sort of square instead of rectangular which is what I was aiming for.


I folded the top in half - putting the shorter sides together. I made sure I smoothed the top, flipped it over and smoothed out the other side. You don't want any big wrinkles! I took my ruler and found the shortest measurement from the fold to the edge. I took that measurement and put a mark at each end. This is where I lined up the ruler for my first cut.


Here I have the top ready for my first trimming cut. You can see that with the long ruler I can cut in one swipe. Read on for the details about this ruler. The ruler is held with my extra hands - bricks wrapped in batting and leftover fabric. I used drapery fabric because it is heavier and I had it laying around.



I turned the top and cut the sides next. I layed my 60" ruler down as close the the edge as possible then laid my large square plastic ruler at the fold and used it as a guide to make sure I was squared up with the folded edge. I held the two rulers together using them like one unit. I also had checked before I cut that I could just see the eddge of the underneath side of the top. Again I used my handy dandy covered bricks to hold the ruler at each end while I cut. I repeated this procedure and trimmed the other side.



Here you can see the name of the company, Johnson Level and Tool Mfg. I do not have any endorsement deal with them or the Home Depot which is where I bought this 60" ruler. All I can say was that it was one of those tools I don't know how I ever lived without it.


You can see here the thickness of this ruler which makes it ideal for a straight edge cutting tool.


I am going to use the leftover backing from the baseball t-shirt quilt that I had cut off before I stamped the backing. It is not quite enought so I cut the backing so that I have a piece that is the full width (shown here under the quilt top which is still folded in half) and the other piece (sitting on top of the quilt top) which is short of covering the back. I will use leftover scraps and yardage of the fabrics I used on the quilt top to make the backing big enough.


Other projects this weekend are lenghting the sleeves on a lined jacket, moving the sleeves of another jacket to take out excess fabric across the back between the sleeves, pin basting the baseball t-shirt quilt, and cleaning out the garage if the weather is warm enough.