An archive of sewing tutorials and inspiration

     

Cutting The Curves // Retro Rubies QAL

This is week three of the Retro Rubies Quilt Along. Some of you may be just joining us, but you are not too late! You can stop by the Retro Rubies QAL page, to see a list of all the posts to date. Also If you haven't stopped by the flickr group I encourage you to do so.

Creating Templates

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There are a few different ways to create templates for cutting. You could use regular paper, thick card stock, or even plastic templates. I use this size quarter circle template quite often, so I decided to create plastic templates. You can purchase sheets of heavy weight plastic at Joann's for $4.99/ea in the quilting section. Just trace your template from the back of the magazine onto the plastic and cut it out with craft scissors.

Cutting the Fabric

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Before you begin cutting the fabric be sure to starch and press it (see the starching video tutorial). Here is a starching tip for curves… heavily starch the fabric that you will be using for the inner curves and mildly starch the fabric you plan to use for the outer curves. You want the inner curves to be pretty stiff, and the outer curves to have structure, but still flexible. You can cut more than one piece of fabric at a time if you starch and press each layer of fabric together.

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When cutting curves it may seem un-natural to use a rotary cutter as opposed to scissors, but I strongly suggest a rotary (the smaller the blade the better). Make sure to use a fresh new rotary blade. For right handers cut your inner curves starting on the bottom cutting up/left, and for left handers cut starting on the bottom cutting up/right.

How many to cut?

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How many curves and rectangles you cut will depend completely on what size quilt you want to make. Reference the instructions in the magazine and if you would like to make a throw size quilt double the amount in the instructions.

Featured Sponsor

Marmalade Fabrics is dedicated to providing modern fabric to quilters & artists. They carry a variety of modern fabric from diverse manufacturers as well as fun and modern patterns. They have a HUGE selection of solid fabrics and wonderful basic color bundles.

Giveaway

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Marmalade Fabrics is giving away a 42 piece 10" layer cake of  Simply Color to one lucky Pile O’ Fabric reader. This giveaway is open to all readers even if you are just following along and not sewing along.

First Step To Enter To Win…

The first step to enter the giveaway is to leave a blog post comment telling me what your favorite step of making a quilt is.

For Bonus Entries

This giveaway will end Friday, May 17th, at 12 a.m. EST. Mr. Random will choose two winners and I will announce their name Friday on Facebook and Twitter and I will email the winner directly. a Rafflecopter giveaway Now get to working cutting into those precious fabrics!
Alyssa
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Creator of Pile O' Fabric

Questions/Comments