Well I was off the grid for a few days. Last week was quite a week, starting with a 5.8 earthquake here in Maryland on Tuesday (very unusual for us), then ending with Hurricane Irene hitting here on Saturday. This is a picture of the trees that fell into our yard during Irene
(yes, that's my vegetable garden under that mess ~ that's ok the stink bugs were starting to take over my tomatoes and peppers anyway).
So Saturday as the storm was bearing down, I spent the day here chain piecing and watching the news. I figured I'd sew as long as I had electric.
Then I did have the forethought to press and press while the power remained on for the iron.
Then during the night as the strongest part of the storm hit here, we did lose our electric.
So I spent Sunday cutting. I thought I'd show you my favorite little ruler for trimming and squaring up Half Square Triangles. This is the
Quilt in a Day Triangle Square Up Ruler. It's so easy to use, just place the line on the middle seam of the HST (here I'm using the 2 1/2" line because that's the size that I want my squares to be cut), and trim on the two sides.
Then turn and repeat on the other side. I always make my HST's a tad larger and cut/square them down to the exact size that I want. No matter how exact I try to sew my seam allowances, slight variations in sewing and pressing can make them come out to be different sizes, so trimming them to the exact measurement wanted makes for easier piecing of my quilts :)
And voila, a perfect HST every time ~
and since our electric was off for 20 hours, I have about a gazillion of these little buggers!
All that chain piecing on Saturday, and cutting on Sunday resulted in me being in the middle of about four projects that I have going now.
Hopefully I'll have some finishes that I can show you soon :)
And don't forget the Notions sale that's still going on at my website if you like that little ruler. Use the discount code TOOLSFORME at check out for 20% off anything in the
Favorite Notions section!
Enjoy the day!
~ Dawn
4 comments:
Glad you got through the storm ok. We did too! Love that ruler!
I see you are using the Stylist machine. How's it working for you?? I may have to dig out mine and give it a whirl. It's been in hiding since I got my Bernina ;-D
I love that ruler too - but you know if you put the line of the ruler on the sewn line BEFORE you press it open you only have to cut along 2 sides instead of all 4. I believe that is on the inside of the instructions LOL! Great to hear you got through the storm fine.
@Katrina ~ Thanks for the tip! I have tried that too, but I found I still distort things in pressing, I think I'm a better presser from years of practice now, so I think I'll try it again :)
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