How to Cut Quilt Pieces Larger Than Your Ruler
Let Your Mat Come to the Rescue!
Have you ever struggled to accurately cut a square, rectangle or strip that is wider than your ruler? Perhaps you were cutting the backing for a mini quilt, a pillow cover, or a wide border, for example.
The solution is in letting your cutting mat guide the way, along with judicious folding. While we don’t normally recommend using the lines on your mat to align a piece for cutting (they sometimes aren’t exact), for larger pieces they can be a godsend.
In fact, unlike piecing standard-sized blocks, in many cases a tiny discrepancy won’t matter in wide cuts for small quilt backings and such. In those cases the mat’s measurement are likely to work just fine.
Kelli from The Willow Market has written an excellent tutorial that shows how to use the markings on the mat along with a ruler to cut pieces that are wider than the ruler. It’s a simple process, once you understand how it works.
One note we’d add is that when you’re cutting from yardage, as Kelli is in the example, fold the length of fabric so it rests on the edge of the table. Letting it hang off the edge can pull and cause distortion.
