Natalie: Hi I’m Natalie. Welcome to the
Final Stitch. Today we’re going to be talking about trimming and squaring your quilts. Natalie: So I have Liz here with me and she’s
got questions from you that I am excited to answer so Liz. Liz: Hi So our first question is actually
from Renee in Idaho. She says, “I think my quilt maybe shrank a little bit. It was
square when I sent it, but it’s not quite straight now. It just came back from the long-armer,
how do I get it ready for binding, how do I trim it, and make sure it’s square?” Natalie: Alright so that is a great question.
Typically when you get your quilt back from the quilter, it can have, you know, a small
percentage of shrinkage, probably somewhere from like one to three, maybe 5% at most.
And that depends on how it’s stretched on the machine and how dense the stitch pattern
is. If you have a lot of stitches and they’re really close together, it may cause the quilt
to shrink just a little bit which is totally typical and no big deal. Liz: Totally normal. Natalie: Ya totally normal. It’s just a
part of the process. And it will continue to shrink as you wash it and just kind of,
like, it gets crinkly and comfy and squishy. It’s really not a big deal and totally easy
to fix as you go through and square your quilt which I will show you if you want. Liz: Yes. Do because I think the thing is
if they get that back and it has shrunk a little bit, it might look like it’s not
square anymore. So how do we trim that? Natalie: Right sometimes even with borders
as they’re going along, I know I’ve had a border and I’ve had to like pull it out
to keep it straight as it goes and gets rolled on the machine. Liz: Sure Natalie: So I’ve got an example here for
you. And this is one that we had done here at our quilting department. So you can see
when we get it back, it comes back with backing and batting still attached and you will typically
just have to trim off along the edge. Oh this one also has a fun pieced back for those of
you caught the pieced backing section. Look how pretty that is. I love it. Liz: Nice. Natalie: Ok so I’m going to find a corner.
You just want to pick any corner to start with. This is kind of a big quilt so I’m
going to spread it out. Now typically when I am trimming or squaring a quilt I would
want to use a table that was a little bit taller. This one isn’t going to be perfect
for me because it’s clear down, this is my sewing table. And if I was, ideally I would
have a table that was more like waist height. And I would want my arm and elbow to be able
to cut at an angle that was more comfortable and more ergonomically correct. Just so that
I didn’t have shoulder pain or back pain. Liz: Good tips. Natalie: The other thing that I would do before
we get started is I would turn my cutting mat. Now my mat is attached by double stick
tape on the corners which is also a great tip so it doesn’t slide around. So I’m
just going to pick that up and flip it this way because at this angle I have a lot more
cutting space for my long ruler to cut those long sides of your quilt. So we’ve got that
set up. I’ve got the bottom corner here. And you can see that I know this quilt was
totally straight. Can you guys see that? But at this point you can see that it looks kind
of crinkly and a little, you know, it’s not perfectly straight looking anymore and
that’s just because of the way that it bunches from the stitching. Alright so I’m going
to grab some tools. I’ll use a long ruler to cut, obviously my rotary cutter. Natalie: Alright so I’ve got my square ruler
and now this is how I would get started on trimming my quilt. I’m going to start with
my square. And right here you can see there’s a lot of measurements to look at. So I’m
going to line it up. This, let’s see. So we’re going to go with the width of our
borders which they probably started out at 6 ¼ or 6 ½ inches. So this is a finished
measurement, six from the seam out to here which is what I’m going to use. And it’s
the same on this side. So you’ve got six inches of border here and six inches of border
here. Now you can if you want to do a little tug and pull and stretch to make sure that
everything lines up just right. But if you cut this corner using this square you know
that you started with a perfectly square corner. And the rest of it you can continue with your
long tool until you get up to the top square, the top corner square. And then you can use
your square again. Liz: Perfect. Natalie: Which you don’t have to start with
a square tool but I like to because it gives you a lot more view of, you know, all your
lines and making sure that you’ve got the same width here and the same width there.
And it’s all good. It’s all going to square up. So I usually do, and it’s a little bit
of an awkward cut. But I usually do this bottom cut first and then I’d go up this way and
stop at the edge of that tool. And then I switch to my long tool so that I can get a
nice long cut on the side. Now you’ll see also, I don’t know how closely you guys
can see, but there’s a little bit of basting in this edge. But you can pull the basting
stitch out as you go or you can leave it in because it’s going to be covered by your
binding if it’s within that quarter inch of the edge. Liz: Right so even when you trim a tiny bit
of batting showing, that’s ok because it will get caught in your binding. Natalie: Totally ok. Ya totally ok. Actually
Mom shared with me a really great tip about sometimes you can’t get that square edge
and you do have a gap in your border and she just stitched a piece right on top of it and
pressed it back and caught it in the binding and you’d never know. Liz: Sneaky ninja. Ok, good pro tip. Natalie: Yes. Super good pro tip because I’ve
like cut a half an inch in on my border to cover that before and so if you don’t want
to lose that part of your border it’s great to just stitch a little of the same fabric
and cover it and then you know it’s basically just a stitch and flip. Liz: Ya Natalie: And then you catch that in your binding
and you’d never know that you had a little bit of the batting showing. Alright so as
we continue up, this is a six inch ruler so it’s really easy to see. We use our border
edge to keep it straight and we just continue cutting. Pull that away. Liz: And that’s a good tip too because I
think I’ve always thought you had to use the outside edge. But you’re using the inside
edge of that border to help you stay straight. Natalie: Oh yes, I would much rather trim
from the seam so that my border width stayed the same because if you use the edge, you
may end up with a border that goes from five to four to three, you know, you’re not going
to be able to sure that you’ll keep that the same if you’re not looking at it. And
if your border is smaller you can use the lines to see. You know, say I wanted to cut
this down to a three inch border, I would just line up that line and make sure it stayed
straight. And you can do a little adjusting here and there to make it behave. But ya you
just follow those lines on your ruler. You’re not really using the mat at all except for
as a cutting surface. Liz: Protector surface. Natalie: Ya you’re not going to use your
mat to measure at this point. So we just continue going right along here. And you can, this
is a great opportunity actually to snip little threads. You see we have like a little bit
of thread right here and if I had my little snippers I would snip that. But ya everything
is ready to go. Oops. We’ll get down there. This is a good size quilt. It’s great and
it’s beautiful and it’s going to be a really fun Christmas quilt. Just take your
time and make your adjustments. Liz: And I think actually this is also a Missouri
Star quilt pattern so it is available in the description Natalie: It is. The scrappy four patch star?? Liz: That sounds right. Scrappy Four Patch
Star. Natalie: I could be wrong but. I mean I’m
never wrong. When has that happened before. Liz: When it’s like any quilt can be a Christmas
quilt, this is in the holiday floral line. Natalie: Oh for sure, ya. Liz: And all of a sudden it’s Christmas
stars Natalie: Yep, super cute. Ok so I’m up to
the corner now. So I’m just going to grab my square just to double check and make sure
that we’re all still square. So I’ll go out to that edge. And keeping this square.
And you can see we’ve got a little bit of pull here. So I’m going to, if I had this,
I would want to pull it in so that my border stayed square and my quilt edge stayed square
and that I had a little bit of extra in the middle. Because that’s going to keep your
quilt folding properly. It’s going to make it easier to bind. It’s going to make it
look better when it hangs on a bed. So we’re going to keep our six inch here and our six
inch there. I’m going to pull that down just a tiny bit because I don’t want to
make the corner go off kilter by leaving it out. Liz: OK that makes sense. Natalie: It’s just, it also has to do with
how the quilt is on the table. Liz: Ya. Natalie: You know the way that it’s laid
right now, it’s not laid perfectly flat and so that little bit of bunching can just
be because the bigger part of the quilt is pulling that direction. Liz: Gravity is not being your friend. Natalie: Totally. Ya so this is a way to avoid
running into those issues. Alright so we’ve got our corner here and our corner there.
And then we just continue cutting the rest of that side. All four sides the same, all
the way around. And then you are ready to bind. It’s just that easy. Liz: Yay. So what if you don’t have a border
to follow? Natalie: Oh good question. So we have another
quilt that does not have a specific border. This one is great because it does have pieces
in it. And so the idea here will be basically the same. We’ll find the pieces that we
can use consistently. Liz: So you’re going to choose the pieces
to make your guide? Natalie: Yes. Liz: Ok. Natalie: Right. So you just, every quilt is
different so you’ll pick out what parts you’re going to use as your guide. And you
want to make sure that, so this quilt is great because it’s made in blocks. And the blocks
have consistent pieces. So you’ll see that along this edge, there’s one of these, I
think it’s like three by five maybe here and here. And then on this way you’ve got
one going here and one here. And then you have other sections. So this section is long,
it looks like, I don’t know, three or five inches maybe. I couldn’t tell you because
I didn’t make this particular quilt so I don’t remember the measurements. But this
one is the same as this one. And then this one is the same as this one. So basically
we’re still going to start the same. We’re going to make sure that we’ve got, this
block is measuring at nine inches finished so I’m looking at this seam here and this
seam here. And then I’m also making sure that it’s lined up with the corner so that
tells me that when I cut this edge it’s going to be a square edge. Liz: Nice, ok. Natalie: So that’s how I’m going to start.
And I’ve got both corners and then as I go along I’m going to use, whoops, sorry
about that. I’m going to use this tool, this long ruler and I’m going to find just
about the point that I think lines up the best. And it looks like it’s going to be
at the 4 ½ mark. So this seam right here on this little piece that I showed you earlier,
consistently matches the 4 ½ inch mark on this ruler. So that’s what I’m going to
look for. It doesn’t have to be 100% like on the line, it’s just where you look. I
mean I could even go ⅛ of an inch over to save as much of the quilt as possible. But
then you want to make sure and use that same measurement all the way around the quilt so
that your sides, everything stays measured out correctly Liz: So consistently Natalie: Consistent, yes. Exactly. It’s
not about perfection or a certain measurement. It’s about consistent cutting. Liz: Got it, ok. Natalie: Right. So then I’ll keep that lined
up and I’ll go all the way along the edge. And then you know that when you’ve got your
quilt trimmed that it is going to be square. So I’m just going to keep, I’m choosing
that little ⅛ line because I think that’s a little bit more accurate. To the edge of
the quilt. It saves a bit of it. And I’m going to grab my ruler here and make sure
I’m still at that. Yep, we’ve got a nine inch square there. And a nine inch there.
I’m going to pull it in and adjust a little bit. And it’s just a little bit off in that
corner but that is just fine. Alright. And then we just keep going all the way around
the whole rest of the quilt. Liz: Ok. So you found, in this case because
there wasn’t a border to follow, you found a spot. Natalie: I found something to follow. Yes.
So I have a couple pieces here. I have this quilt that we made as a sample just kind of
like a baby quilt. It’s like a, what do they call that? Liz: Whole cloth Natalie: A whole cloth quilt. And so there’s
several things you can do. Obviously you’re still going to look at your corners and make
sure that it’s square. And so, you know, we could trim this edge and then follow that.
And then the other thing, the other points for whole cloth quilts is it’s going to
have the same kinds of measurements as another. If you think of a square ruler, it will have
a 45 so you can fold it in this way and make sure that that matches up. And so if you want,
you know, if your quilt is supposed to be square then you would cut at that place. If
it’s not supposed to be square you can fold it and then measure to make sure this measures
the same width from top to bottom. Liz: Ok Natalie: Ya. So the other thing you can do
is fold it in half rectangularly and just make sure that everything matches up. And
if it doesn’t, so you can see here like this one is not 100% square. I could go through
and figure out, is it this line or that line that’s crooked and then square it up from
there. And you always, always if you start from square corners, you’ll be able to meet
them in the middle and end up with a square quilt. Liz: So guys if you’d like to see us do
more with whole cloth quilts let us know in the comments. Natalie: Ya it’s a tricky one. It’s tricky
because whole cloth doesn’t have anything to follow. Liz: Right, nothing to make your guide so
you’ve got to do a little extra. Natalie: Right. Yep. Liz: So we have another question. If you guys
give us a second to clear up then we have another question about curves. Alright so
the other question that we have to talk about today is from Mary in Iowa. She says, “I’d
like to add a little something to the borders of my quilts. I’m thinking about curving
the corners. How can I do that evenly on all four corners?” Natalie: Ok so if you’ve already trimmed
your quilt and you know that all your corners are already square then it’s super easy
to add a curve. And I would just use a tool you have around the house. Maybe you already
have a circle magic, or a drunkard’s path, or a large orange peel tool or a roll of duct
tape or a coffee cup Liz: A dinner plate, whatever your curve is. Natalie: It’s really how big you want it.
And I’ll show you really quick some of the differences. So I have the large orange peel
here and what I would do is line it up because I already know that this corner is squared.
So I’m going to line it up on the corners. And you can just use your template because,
you know, if this is along the edge and this is along the edge then you know you’re going
to get the same shape curve on all four sides. And then you just trim this section off. Now
if you wanted a smaller curve you could use this tool and just curve it like this. And
this is basically, I mean if you put four of these together it’s basically like a
little bitty salad place, you know. And you could do really whatever size circle you want.
You just want to make sure that you set it along the same edges. And then if you do that
because it’s already a squared corner you won’t have any trouble making them all the
same. Liz: And so you just use your rotary cutter
and curve that? Natalie: Yep, trim that straight off. And
here’s another piece that, this is the inside of the drunkard’s path. It’s pretty similar
but a different curve, a different angle. And all of these would be really fun. You
know any one is fine. And then if you wanted to do like a straight, like what would that
be? Liz: Oh to like to turn into a hexi or octagon
or something like that? Natalie: Ya , then you would just use this,
you know, and you measure out your edge. So let me see, actually this one is going to
be easier because this is where these lines get fun because the 45 is going to tell you
that you have a 45 degree angle going the other direction. So, let’s see, if we do
it. Ope, I’m way more angley challenged than my mom. Nope not quite. Ok. So if you
line that up on the 45 then you know that this is going to be a squared 45 degree angled
cut. Liz: Nice. And so it will be even on all four
sides because you’re using that line? Natalie: Ya and same with like, here’s the
60. It’s going to be not the same because it’s a 60 degree so you’ll have like a
narrower edge here and then a wider edge here. 45 is what I would do personally. And then
you can adjust it. Because you have it lined up here you know it’s going to land in the
same place on both sides Liz: Got it. Natalie: That’s how that works. It gives
you that guideline and then you know. Now if you’re doing this and you want to make
sure this size is the same, this is where your mat comes into play. So you could put
it in the corner of your mat, or not the corner, just pick a corner. If you just make sure
that each corner has the same number of squares then they’ll all match and it’s going
to be really cute. It’s just a fun, different way to make your quilts just a little bit
fancier. A little bit different. Liz: I love it. So Mary from Iowa, we hope
that answers your question. And if you have more questions, guys, ask them in the comments
below. We love seeing your questions and comments. And thank you for joining us. Natalie: And share your projects. Show and
tell. Liz: Yes share your projects Natalie: We love to see all the things that
you’ve made. So this has been Trimming and Squaring your quilts and I hope that we inspired
you to try something new and get creative and also a few helpful tips, maybe. And I
look forward to joining you the next time on The Final Stitch.
