Hey there.
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I'm Nicole Gilbert
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and you've joined the steps growling start sewing podcast. Are you new to sewing and want to start
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folding but
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have no idea where to begin?
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Each Wednesday? Join
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me as I
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share the ins and outs of that club life. If you don't have a sewing machine, have no idea how much fabric you need. Or you're just trying to figure out where the heck to stick that bobbin
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This is the podcast for you. Hey, folks,
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Nicole here. Welcome to Episode 54
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of the stop scrolling
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start sewing podcast. In today's episode, we're chatting about cutting. But first, I wanted to open the floor to something new that I'd like to try. I would like to start a segment on the podcast where I answer your questions. My favorite part of being a quote instructor is just really hearing about the pain points that quilters are running into, and assisting y'all over those hurdles. So I thought what a great thing it would be if I could, depending on how many questions I get every week or bi bi weekly or monthly. I answer a bunch of listener questions. So if you would like to submit a question, you can head on over to Nicole Gilbert quotes.com slash questions. Okay. I cannot wait to hear from y'all. Okay, guys, let's get sewing. So something that I'm hearing over and over again, from my students is that they're having issues with cutting, which is obviously concerning, because if you're cutting us off, then your seams are off, and then your quilt top can begin to spiral out of control. And that's really stressful, especially because cutting is like the first step. Even though it's not really the first stage of quilting, because we're preparing our fabrics. We're ironing, we're doing all this jazz. But it's the first step of the quote process that feels like you're like actively doing something like what like this task is the first stage of actually putting your quilt top together. So if it's not going well, it can easily affect how you feel for the rest of the process. So super frustrating. But I want to chat about the whole cutting process, a little tips, a little tricks and see if maybe I can help a few of you out. Because I have had some really great productive conversations with my students that are just approaching the halfway point in the monocultures Academy logical in 60 days. And I just wanted to share some insights that that we had together. So let's get to it. Alright, so first up with cutting, let's make sure that we're using the right tools. Now. I'm sure you've heard me tell the story about the first time I made a queen sized quilt, which was my first quilt ever, and I made five inch squares and I hand cut with a pair of kitchen shears, five inch squares, they were wonky, they were off it took forever. I'm sure you're sensing a tone here like Don't, don't be me. So first and foremost, let's talk about the tools. We want to be using a rotary cutter and an acrylic ruler and a self healing mat. Now for a rotary cutter I suggest if you're only going to get one rotary cutter, getting a 45 millimeter that's going to be the most standard. I personally like the stick style. I know that there are some of you out there who have like carpal tunnel or some breast or knuckle issues and so an ergonomic an ergonomic rotary cutter is more comfortable. I personally just enjoy a plain old classic stick for for my rotary cutter and that's all referring to the shape of the handle. Now for our acrylic ruler, I always suggest that my students start out with a six by 24 inch ruler, you'll be able to do 90% of the cutting that you need to do with a six by 24 inch ruler. Everything else is just to make your life easier or to do things a little bit more quickly. But honestly all of the squaring up you have to do all the
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trimming you have to do you could do it with a six by 24 inch ruler so that's what I would suggest if you're a newbie. Now, if you have money to spend, if you have invested you know you're invested in this short get a companion angles that will be great for your half square triangles, you know, get some square templates so that you can square up your blocks, you know, four and a half inch, six and a half inch, nine and a half inch 12 and a half inch. These are pretty standard sizes there. But again, I want you to start with a six by 24 inch ruler, and then a self healing map. I always suggest to my students to get a 24 by 36 inch mat. Even if you don't have a designated sewing studio, you'll be able to set it up on like a dining room table or a kitchen counter. And you'll have have the space that you need. A lot of times I find that the next size down which is an 18 by 24. It's a great size mat. I take mine to my quilt guild sew ins and things like that. But it can, it can be a little bit limiting in size. So I find that 24 by 36 is small enough to still be usable and put in multiple places, but large enough to really be helpful and you're not going to feel like oh I need a bigger man. As far as brands go for all of these things for your stick, rotary cutter or really any type of rotary cutter Fiskars I always wonder is it fist guards or Fiskars? Anyway, you know, everybody knows what I'm talking about those classic orange handles ganger Martelli or gingrich really gonna be more more shears. Sorry, Martelli, olfa, Omni grid. They all make great rotary cutters. For your acrylic
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ruler,
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again, Omni grid, June Taylor. I think all four makes them. The ones that I have. I'm actually looking at my wall right now because I have them up on a pegboard. I have a June Taylor and an omni grid. You know, Fiskars makes makes one two. I actually like the Fiskars one a lot because it comes in really bright colors. And I like how much the markings stand out from your fabric underneath it. And then as far as mats go, I mean, again, most of the brands that I just mentioned, make maps as well. I happen to really like the Riley Blake Designs, cutting mats,
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they're really thick, really
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sturdy,
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they're kind of non slip. They come in fun colors, and I just, I generally genuinely enjoy it. But so that's that for tools, those are the tools we're going to want to use. Now, let's talk about cutting across the width of your fabric. Now most quilting cotton is going to run 42 to 45 inches across the width of the fabric. For those of you who are unfamiliar with with the fabric or who f which is how you'll commonly see it written out. It is the distance salvage to salvage. That is how the width of fabric is measured. And you'll notice I suggested a cutting mat that's 24 by 36 inches. Obviously that would mean that 40 some odd inches is going to hang off and not really be cuttable. So we need to fold our fabric to cut across the width of our fabric. Now this is something that I teach my students how to fold the fabric. And if you do do it properly, it makes your life a lot easier. It makes storing your fabric a lot easier. Because instead of cutting across or attempting to cut across 40 some odd inches of fabric, you're cutting across about 10 to 12 inches, which is easy peasy lizard squeezy as my four year old who is obsessed with PJ Masks would say so. So we want to fold it and what I do is I fold it salvage to salvage and then fold from the fold line back to the salvage again. And now you've got this neat little pack neat little folded up length, and then you roll it up. This is one of the hard parts about a podcast you just can't see it. But I'm telling you, it's awesome. It's so it makes your life so much easier to cut this to cut across the width of fabric this way. Now when you're cutting across the width of fabric, it does take a little bit of practice and that is something I will get to in a little bit as far as making sure that we're keeping a nice crisp straight line, even across those places where it's folded. But now what we really need to talk about is how we're going to measure so something I think this is probably one of the largest places where my students were running into hiccups. And it was you know you have marked lines on your mat. Then you have marked lines on your ruler. And these are all, you know, I mean in inches an inch in inches, an inch is an inch. However, what's not standardized is the thickness of that line, the painted the marking on the ruler or the mat. And you'll notice like, I have to, well, I have a six by 24 inch and a six by 18 inch rulers. And those are my two big go twos. And then I have my cutting mat, all three of them use different size lines. Now, the centers of each of those lines are what is the actual like, inch interval. But even on my cutting mat, my cutting mat uses three different style lines to denote different information. So I've got like a big thick dotted line, which is like common cuts. So it's like an eighth, a quarter, two thirds, you know, so on and so forth. Have a yard, and so there's a big, heavy, thick dotted lines, then I've got thin dotted lines for my half inches, and then thin straight followed lines for my full inches. And there's all different variations across my different rulers. So depending on where you line up your lines, and where you measure from, you could end up being like a 16th of an inch off. And again, a 16th of an inch doesn't make a huge difference in a single seam. However, if you have 200 inches 200 seams, and you're off by a 16th each time, every 16 seams, you're going to be off an inch, which means every 100 seams, you're going to be off like what, six or seven inches. And which means across 200 seems you're gonna be off 14 inches, that's a foot
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that's over a foot. Do you see how this could like really spiral out of control,
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and this is you being off by only a 16th of an inch, which is pretty small. So we really want to make sure that I using the grids on both the mat and the ruler is important. But we want to make sure we measure off of only one of them. And we're remaining consistent across the board. So if you're using a specific line to mark off of it's always going to be that line. And it's a specific point
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on that line,
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it's always going to be a specific point on that line that you're using consistency matters almost more than accurate measurement. Obviously accurate measurement matters, especially once you start getting into you know cuts with triangles and whatnot in them. However, you can make it work as long as every single piece is the same size. Now, what this means or what this can look like for you is you line up the straight edge of your fabric along one of the lines on your cutting mat to make sure that your fabric is square.
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Okay, then
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you use your ruler.
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You use the grids on your cutting mat to make sure that your ruler is straight. Okay, so our, our cutting mat we're using, but it's all in reference to keeping things straight and square, we're going to actually measure with the lines on our ruler. We don't want to measure with the lines on our mat and then cut you using measurements on our ruler as well. When you start to mix those up. Those different size lines on those different tools are going to mess you up. And you're going to get slowly often off and off and off. So let's keep that in mind. Pick one thing to use as the measurement source. And that be the only thing you use as the measurement source. Now let's talk about another thing that can get your cuts off. And that is the movement of your ruler. Now, when we're holding an acrylic ruler in place, we want to use just our fingertips. Now, the reason why we don't use the palm of our hand is because when you use the palm of your hand, you actually get a smaller pressure point. Because when you use the palm of your hand, the tips of your fingers don't have much strength in them all the power is going through the palm of your hand. Now that's a much smaller area. Where the pressure is on the on the acrylic ruler, versus if you lift your hand up, so it's like a little claw, and you've got your fingertips on, that's a larger area, you want to be able to distribute the pressure on your ruler to as large of an area as possible. I have noticed, I am taller. And I have kind of larger hands. And so I noticed that ruler working with acrylic rulers is actually a lot easier for me than a lot of my students. I, you'll remember a few episodes back, I had a guest, Stephanie who went through one of my earlier courses. And she is just the tiniest little peanut, she's super cute. But like, she's like my hand, she's like I can't, every time I move my hand. So when it's in this clock position, you kind of like inch it up the ruler, as you're moving up the ruler and making cuts. Every time she interrupts her hand, there's the potential for that ruler to slip,
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which is
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a bummer. Because every time the ruler slips a little, that means your cuts going to be off a little. So we don't want to do that. But you do need to inch your hands if you have smaller hands. One thing I will say, which I think is a great help is it's by Gypsy quilter. And it's a gypsy gripper looks like a giant telephone with suction cups on either end, you use that on your ruler, and you're holding the handle, but the pressure is being applied across the whole ruler. So it really helps it keep it in place.
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That's that's a big help.
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Another is another option that are another thing that's a problem is that sometimes the rulers are just a little bit slippery. I don't know if you've noticed. But earlier, when I was talking about my self healing mat, one of the things I said was that it's a little non slip, which is really nice. Some rooms, some self healing mats are slippery, like super slippery. Like I want to say there's even like martelly mats are very slippery. They're excellent mats, but they're very slippery. And they even suggest only using their brand of rulers, because those are the ones that are made to like not skirt around on them. So keep that in mind. My my mat is very non slip. And I would love that about it. But what you can do is there's something called True grips. Do you know Do you remember when you were in school, and you had like a three ring binder, and there was those little plastic or like stickers that were like circles. And he would put them around the holes on like your worksheet to keep them from tearing out of your three ring binder. Well, true grips look just like that. But they've got like a non skid surface to them. And you just put them like stickers right on the backs of your rulers. And that'll keep your rulers from moving around on you a lot. These are all just like kind of little tips and tricks of the trade that I've picked up along the way that really make a big difference. But overall, what I really need to say about cutting is that practice is what's going to make perfect for you guys. Rome wasn't built in a day, the first time I cut, I mean the first time I cut properly using a rotary cutter, we're not even going to discuss those five inch squares that are cut out with kitchen chairs. But it wasn't great, not gonna lie. And each time got better. And better and better. And now I can say I can like rotary cut, like Bing, bang, boom, I'm good to go off to the races. And even still, every once in a while there's gonna be a wonky piece. So don't take it, too personally, don't get too frustrated. Don't let this be the step that makes you think I can never be a quilter because I cannot even cut my pieces accurately. You can I promise you, you can. It just takes a little bit of time and a lot of patience. And you'll get there. I promise. If you have any questions you can always reach out to me at Nicole at Nicole Gilbert quotes.com. I'm happy to help. But even better submit your questions at Nicole Gilbert quotes.com slash questions, and maybe you'll hear the answer to your question right here on the podcast. Okay, guys, you have just finished another episode of the stop scrolling start sewing podcast. Thank you so much for hanging out with me. And make sure you never miss an episode by hitting sub bribe wherever you listen to podcasts. Now stop scrolling and start sewing.