Fireside Quilt Sew Along Week 2: Cutting

Join the Fireside sew along for extra sewing tips on making this modern, beginner-friendly quilt pattern. suzyquilts.com #quilting

We're back with Week 2 of the Fireside quilt sew along! This week we let out our inner tiger and do lots of ripping and roaring. Are you ready to get wild??

If you're finding this sew along for the first time, be sure to check out our first introductory post and the Week 1 post in the Fireside sew along tab so you know all about the great prizes and schedule for each week.

Fireside Sew Along Recap & Schedule

  • Sign-up: You do not sign up for the sew along, however I highly recommend signing up for the Suzy Quilts newsletter so you stay up to date with our weekly blog posts and prizes.
  • Sewing Questions: You've got questions, we've got answers! The best place to ask your technical sewing questions Suzy Quilts Patterns Facebook group. The main purpose of sew alongs is to answer questions that pop up during the quilt-making process so don't ever worry about asking a "stupid" question. They don't exist!
  • Weekly IG LIVE Videos: We're back with IG LIVE videos (YAY!!) so join me every Tuesday at 8pm CST
  • Prizes and Discounts: Aside from having a beautiful finished quilt top, you also can win weekly prizes by using #FiresideQuiltSA in the comments of your posts on Instagram. More details on that are at the bottom of this post.

The following longarmers will be offering 25% off longarm quilting on all Fireside quilts for at least three months after the sew along: 

Fireside Sew Along Schedule

Quilt Supplies for Week 2

Cutting straight strips doesn't require any special tools other than the basic ones you probably already have. If you want to know what tools I use in the video below they are...

Join the Fireside sew along for extra sewing tips on making this modern, beginner-friendly quilt pattern. suzyquilts.com #quilting

Week 2 Assignment: Cutting

One of the main reasons the Fireside pattern is labeled as "Beginner" is because of its simple straight forward cutting. You only cut two shapes — strips and rectangles. If you are brand new to cutting fabric for a quilt, check out this video I filmed during the Adventureland sew along.

Tip #1: Consider prewashing your fabric.

In Week 1 of our Fireside sew along we finalized our quilt pattern layouts and picked fabric. If you caught my Tuesday night Instagram LIVE (every Tuesday at 8pm CT during the sewing along) you heard me mention the option to prewash fabric.

I'm not a stickler for prewashing fabric, but if you are concerned about cutting straight strips while making your Fireside, PREWASH. Woven fabric (that includes the "quilting cotton" or cotton broadcloth you are probably using) is made by weaving threads together both vertically and horizontally. For a detailed description on how fabric is made, see this post How is Fabric Made

Those threads can be stretched and distorted after being wrapped around a bolt. Prewashing your fabric helps those threads figure become unwarped and settle into their proper vertical and horizontal weave.

Tip #2: Rip to get started.

If you prewashed your fabric you know for certain the vertical and horizontal threads that make up your fabric are no longer distorted or stretched from being on a bolt. That's great news because the next thing we're going to do is rip it up. (Sidenote: even if you opted out of the prewash, this ripping trick will still work great.)

We won't rip every strip, but we will snip through one of the selvages, close to the edge of the fabric, and rip from one selvage to the other. If your rip doesn't make it from selvage to selvage, snip again and rip again until it does.

Join the Fireside sew along for extra sewing tips on making this modern, beginner-friendly quilt pattern. suzyquilts.com #quilting
Join the Fireside sew along for extra sewing tips on making this modern, beginner-friendly quilt pattern. suzyquilts.com #quilting

The reason we do this is to get the edge of our fabric on grain. But Suzy, why does it matter if our fabric is on grain? We're not making a dress! Yes, true, but we are cutting long strips and those tend to bow at the center if your fabric is cut off grain.

Join the Fireside sew along for extra sewing tips on making this modern, beginner-friendly quilt pattern. suzyquilts.com #quilting

If you don't want to sew with a strip that has a ripped edge, from here you can line your ruler up with the ripped edge and trim it off. Check out this quick video to see what I mean. This was filmed during the Grow sew along.

Tip #3: Label your fabrics to stay organized.

If you're making the multi-colored version, or some variation of that, you are juggling upwards of 10 different fabrics. That's a lot to keep in the ol' noggin! One thing I like to do is trim off a little bit of each fabric and tape it to my cutting mat as a reference. If you aren't sure you have extra fabric to do this, a snip of a selvage is all you need.

I even went so far as to write the Color numbers on the tape with a Sharpie.

Join the Fireside sew along for extra sewing tips on making this modern, beginner-friendly quilt pattern. suzyquilts.com #quilting

Once everything is cut I try to keep the fabrics stacked and in order.

Join the Fireside sew along for extra sewing tips on making this modern, beginner-friendly quilt pattern. suzyquilts.com #quilting

If you are sewing in a small space, a drying rack is also a great way to keep unfinished strips and blocks in order. You may remember seeing this drying rack during the Grow sew along. It's my go-to way to keep long strips and rows organized without having them thrown all over my cutting table, iron, furniture and dog. This is a photo of my Gather sew along progress.

Join the Fireside sew along for extra sewing tips on making this modern, beginner-friendly quilt pattern. suzyquilts.com #quilting

Questions?

Do you have questions about supplies, fabric or cutting? There are multiple places for you to get answers!

  1. Here in the blog comments.
  2. In the Suzy Quilts Patterns Facebook group.
  3. During one of the weekly IG LIVE videos. (Honestly though, this one is the least reliable. I miss a lot of questions during those videos.)

Week 2 Sponsor & Prize

Did you love Kim's Fireside quilts turned kits from Crimson Tate? Us too! You can actually still get both kits if you are catching up and want to sew along with us.

Fireside is a modern beginner-friendly quilt pattern that includes queen/full, twin, throw and baby quilt sizes along with instructions and fabric requirements for multiple color variations
Fireside is a modern beginner-friendly quilt pattern that includes queen/full, twin, throw and baby quilt sizes along with instructions and fabric requirements for multiple color variations

Crimson Tate is our Week 2 sponsor and they are giving away a 10-piece Charley Harper Vanishing Birds 1/2 yd. bundle. I love Charley Harper fabric so much I actually designed a free quilt pattern based on it! Check out the Bird Watching quilt pattern if you're interested. 🙂

How to Win

  • Post a pic to Instagram. The photo prompt for Instagram this week is to post a picture of your sew along progress. Use #FiresideQuiltSA in the caption.
  • You must have a public Instagram profile to participate.
  • Each photo posted is an entry and you can enter as many times as you want in a single week. Once the week is over, those posts do not count in the next week's giveaway. Every week we start fresh.
  • Your photo must be posted between Friday, September 30 and Friday, October 7. The winner will be picked randomly from all qualifying posts and announced at approximately 4:00 p.m. on the 7th. Good luck!

3 thoughts on “Fireside Quilt Sew Along Week 2: Cutting

  1. C. Miles says:

    Hi Suzy and friends, I have a question about the strips I’m this quilt. I understand that they are cut and sewn together, but it never says here nor in the pattern about sub-cutting. In fact, in page 9 of the pattern, I believe it says that the diagram is not the dimensions for sub-cutting, but if this is so, then I am confused about how we piece the blocks if we do not sub-cut. Hopefully this all makes sense 😂.

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