How to use AccuQuilt GO! Fabric Cutting Machine

[Music] i'm emily from homemade emily jane today i want to show you exactly how to use an aqua quilt go fabric cutting machine to cut out pieces for your next quilt project if you're curious about different accuquil models the one that i'm using is an accuquilt go it's a hand crank machine but it works pretty similarly to the accu quilt gold big which is an electric version of it or the accu-quilt me which is a smaller hand crank model so a lot of what i share today will be applicable to both of those if you're curious about fabric cutting machines in general check out this video up above that compares two different types of fabric cutting machines and will help you pick out which one is the best for you and the projects that you have in mind before we get started talking about the accuquilt go i want to invite you to subscribe to my youtube channel and also be sure to check out homemadeemilyjane.com right let's get started before you start actually cutting out your fabric for your next quilt project using your accuquilt it's a good idea to plan out your quilt accu-cool offers all kinds of different resources free patterns ideas inspiration to help you get started with this and one of my favorite tools is the accu go quilt software it's completely free and it's on their website and i'll put a link in the description below another really cool way to plan out a quilt is to use a mix and match cube in your choice of size and make blocks based on one of those so if you're unfamiliar with a cube there's a lot you can do with it it's a set of dies it contains eight different dies that come together perfectly to make hundreds of different types of blocks i personally have the eight inch cube and the 12 inch cube and i love them both and really can't pick a favorite so if you like smaller piecing i would suggest getting a smaller size cube or if you like quicker faster bigger piecing projects go ahead and get one of the larger size cubes you really can't go wrong so once you have an idea of what your quilt is going to look like what colors you need how many fabrics you're going to use we'll go ahead and start gathering our supplies so in order to start cutting your fabrics you will need your fabric you will need your accuquilt cutting machine you'll also need the dies that you'll be using and mats that match the size of your dies or are at least a little bit larger before we get started cutting our fabric i'll go ahead and show you the supplies that i'll be using today in this video first of all my accu quote go cutting machine it stores nice and upright with a handle so i can move it and then when i'm ready to use it i just open it up like so and then it has a hand crank on the side here which runs the dies through the rollers the dies that i'll be using are part of the eight-inch mix-and-match cube which actually came with my machine and the ready set go set which i definitely recommend and i will throw a link in the description below if you shop through my affiliate links it helps me out so i appreciate your support um so the dies that i'll be using are all here once you come up with your plan you'll know exactly which dies to use and how many to cut of each fabric and then of course you'll need a cutting mat as well so if you're using a cube it comes with inside this little specialty booklet set it has the correct size cutting mat if you're ordering other dies that might not come with a mat be sure to check and see if it comes with it or just order your mat separately it's helpful to have a couple extra laying around too now before i actually get started cutting my fabrics with accuquilt i like to do some prep work first so you'll see here i've got my fabric but it needs to be pressed and so i have a spray bottle i actually have best press in my spray bottle but you could use any kind of starch or even homemade starch is great too and then i also have a nice hot iron so i'll give it a little mist and then iron it and it's a good way to prep your fabric before running it through the machine [Music] i personally prefer the misting method of starching because i feel like it gives just a nice thin layer overcoat people starch it differently so i would say just find what method works best for you as long as it's nice and flat it should run through the accu-cool machine just fine it's important to note that the dies that you're running through the machine the blades are actually on the die crooked on purpose so they're at a slight angle so that when you run it through the rollers of the machine it's not hitting a speed bump and instead it can glide over at an angle one thing that you can do that will help keep your fabric on grain later on is to actually draw on your dies with a permanent marker like i've done here you can draw about a quarter inch line around the sides of the dies and then use your lines to to match up your fabric with later on so i'll go ahead and do it this time now [Music] if you are cutting a lot of fabric it might be helpful to cut it down into what i like to call rough cut strips these strips that i cut are about a half inch larger than the actual blades on the die that i'm cutting for the particular shape to give it a little bit of wiggle room and it doesn't really matter if they're super precise because you're going to use the machine to cut your perfect pieces later on all right it's time to start actually cutting your fabric one of the ways that you can handle cutting a lot of yardage at once is to bunch up the fabric and next to the die as you feed it through the machine or to fold it over just kind of to the side of the die but one of the things that i like to do it's kind of an extra step but for me it makes it easier is i'll do rough cut strips so for this one it's three inches from the side to this side so if i'm using this die i will cut three inch strips which i've done here i've got two of them to show you so i'll go ahead and feed these strips through the machine and to me it just makes it a lot easier and like less to worry about so now i will line up the fabric with the edge of the die and put my mat on top and i'm currently cutting four layers i've got some selvage i want to make sure isn't getting is not part of the shape so now i'll put my mat on top anyway as long as it covers all of the blades that you want to cut and then feed it through the machine once your die comes out the other side you can easily take the mat off by sliding it push down a little and slide it off and it'll keep your fabrics in place and then you have a clean mat coming off if you lift the mat directly up it'll bring the fabric with it and it can just get kind of messy so now you'll be able to gently tear off the strips i have a little bit of string that's caught it's helpful to keep a pair of scissors handy just for any extra snips that you might need so for this one i had two little problem areas just little tiny pieces and now we can go ahead and take our pieces off of the die and next we'll run it through the machine again so we have a couple options here we have some tails i find it easy if i have my scissors out just snip them and then i have a trash can right here next to my mat i can throw them out and start with a very clean piece to run through the machine again you don't have to trim them off that's just an option for me i find that this keeps everything really neat and tidy but of course it's not necessary and then we slide it off um what we can actually do as well is we can run it through the machine the opposite direction so i'll go ahead and line it up here put the mat on and then we will crank backwards and feet is going to machine that way slide it off and that was nice and clean so we'll go ahead and take these set them down and then line it up again and this is where the tails get kind of in the way so we'll feed them through and as you can tell it's just pretty rhythmic you do the same steps back and forth back and forth until you get to the end of your strip when you're done you'll have some really tiny scraps i like to go ahead and chop off the bigger pieces like these and save them and then these little guys i'll just throw out another way you can layer your your fabric before you put it through the machine is through using a fan fold using a fan fold is a really cool method if you need a lot of pieces but not a whole strips worth or only a few pieces so you can really find out what works best for you based on the pattern that you've chosen to use now let's say you want to do a fan fold version so instead of using strips and lots of layers you can do a fan fold and for this one i'm using a fat quarter and i'm actually going to fold it in thirds so it has now three layers and it's nice and straight this is an option also if you don't want to do rough cuts because this will feed through the machine nice and evenly so now i'll grab my die just make sure that things are straight and that all three layers nicely cover all areas of the die so that part involves a little bit of manual checking but for this one i've got plenty of room and i'll go ahead and try to get it as on green as possible using the lines place your mat on top and then you can feed it through you'll see that came off nice and even i now have 12 little two and a half inch squares just from that one little pass through the machine next i'll do the same thing with a different die here but this one i do need six layers so this is where things get kind of fun i can line it up and then fold it over so i will get six layers out of this one piece make sure it covers everything on all sides we don't want any partial pieces here and then feed it through now it has six layers so it's a little harder to crank here but we did it slide the die off and then it comes off nice and clean and then you can inspect your pieces make sure that everything came out looking good nice and clean nice and even perfect little quarter triangles and then this is what your fat quarter looks like when you're done what i'll do is just use my scissors and snip off these little pieces and then i'll keep this chunk for scraps later on and then i'll throw out this little netting that we just created so now i've got lots more fat quarters to do that on so i will keep cutting away you'll see once you get started it can go really quickly and it can be really fun and you can just knock out cutting a bunch of pieces really fast which is why i love accuquil and i hope you do too thank you so much for watching this video about how to use an accu quilt go i hope you learned something new and i hope you might be inspired to try using acuquilla on your next project i personally really love mine if you want to learn more about aqui quilt or check out some of my other quilt patterns and tutorials be sure to check out homemade emilyjane.com and of course subscribe to my youtube channel so you can see me here more often

Channel: Homemade Emily Jane

Views: 24,674

Rating: 4.9047618 out of 5

Keywords: Quilting, Learn to Quilt, Sewing, Homemade Emily Jane, AccuQuilt, fabric cutting machine, cutting fabric, quilting for beginners, AccuQuilt Qube, accuquilt tutorials, AccuQuilt die, how to cut fabric with accuquilt, accuquilt go fabric cutter, cutting fabric for quilting, quilt block tutorial, quilt block tutorials free, easy quilting designs for beginners, quilting tutorial, fabric cutting die, quilting, accuquilt go, accuquilt for beginners, accuquilt go die, accuquilt cube

Id: B5j6e6aIziI

Length: 13min 15sec (795 seconds)

Published: Sun Oct 04 2020