QUILT PIECING TIP – PATTY ANN’S PASTIMES

I have a fantastic quilt piecing tip to share with you. It is not an original tip. I read about it a long time ago in a quilting book, and I have had the opportunity to utilize this quick piecing tip many times over.

**Using a rotary cutter, cutting mat, and ruler, I quickly cut 160 strips measuring 1-1/2 inches by 21 inches.**

For the quilt I’m working on now, I had to cut 160 strips measuring 1-1/2 inches by 21 inches (see picture above). I was able to use my scrap pile consisting of many different colored prints. Then these strips needed to be sewn together to make a total of 80, 2-piece strip units. To make this task easier and faster, follow these steps:

**2. Put right sides together on several strip units. Pin at top to keep units together. Place these beside your sewing machine so they are handy to grab.**
**These are the only pins I use throughout this process.**

**3. Remove pin at top. Making sure edges stay even, sew 1/4-inch seam.**

**4. Remove pin on your next strip, line up the strip with the previous one and get ready to continue sewing a 1/4-inch seam. DO NOT CUT THREAD.**

**5. While leaving a small space between the two-strip unit, continue sewing your 1/4-inch seam, as seen above.**

**6. Remove pin from next strip unit and line it up the same way as in step 4.**

**7. Leave the same type of gap between units as you continue to sew your 1/4-inch seam.**

**8. Keep repeating steps 1 through 5 until you have a long string of 2-piece quilt units.This is what it looks like behind my sewing machine as I am sewing. You can**
**sew as many units together as you like, I do about 15-20 units at a time but I**
**could sew all 80 if I wanted. Keep an extra bobbin or two on hand so you**
**don’t have to cut the thread until you choose to**.

**9. Cut apart in the thread space between the units. If you aren’t done sewing your units together, keep one unit in the machine so you can start Step 1 easily.**
**My string of quilt units looks something like the picture above.**

**10. These 2-piece units have been pressed open with the under side seam facing the dark fabric. You can also press the seams open if you so desire. Now these quilt-pieced**
**strips are ready to be cut into 2-1/2 inch units as my quilt pattern specifies.**

I can’t begin to tell you how much time this saves when you have the daunting task of sewing many quilt piece units together. The thread spaces between the units don’t have to be perfect, just enough room to cut them apart. As I said before, you can sew as many together as you want. I sew until I am tired of sitting, then I cut some apart and press those and either immediately or at a later time I sew the rest. That way, the process is broken up and doesn’t feel so tedious to me.

Have fun using this time-saving quilting tip!