Thursday, January 05, 2012

Using the Scraps From the Lil' Twister Ruler

Hi all!

I teach how to use the Lil' Twister ruler frequently (because I seriously <3 this ruler) and the most frequent question I get is - what do I do with the waste?  So, since I was piecing a new store sample yesterday I thought that I would share with you all what I do with mine.

 

The Twister ruler is really cool - you can make interlocking pin-wheels easily from a straight set of blocks with a border.  You can see the twister ruler on the bottom with a couple of cut blocks.

 

Once the twister is cut and re-pieced there is waste from the sides and from the center of each block.  Luckily I have my Accuquilt Go! cutter - but you can do this with a rotary cutter as well - don't worry!


The waste from the center of each block fits wonderfully on my 2" square die (you all know how I love my 2" squares).  So, I just load up the die with over-lapping scrap squares.

 

And, run it through my cutter.


After that, I sort out the little bits of scraps and toss them.  What's left is a bunch of 2" squares - yey!

 

Next I take the border scrap pieces and use my 1.5" finished half square triangle (HST) die.  These pieces won't fit on the 2" square die so the HST die comes in very handy.  I think these might also fit on the 2" finished HST die too; but, the 1.5" HST die and the 2" square die work perfectly together.

 

Once you have a bunch of these scraps, you ca,n either save them for a leaders and enders project, or, just start piecing away!  I am going to do a scrap split nine-patch project with mine.  Here are the scraps laid out and ready to be pieced.

 

And here they all are sewn together.  I think that maybe a couple hundred or so more of these and I would have a really neat quilt!  Obviously there is a lot of different things you could do with squares and HST but I've always been so attracted to the split nine-patch.

I thought that I might share this tip here since so many people wonder what to do with the scraps from the Lil' Twister ruler.  Do you have any other suggestions for things to do with these scraps?  I'd love to hear them.

Happy Quilting!

3 comments:

beaquilter said...

what a great idea for the scraps... I'm not LIKING my twisty ruler, but only used it once and maybe I just don't like the base quilt I made for it to begin with...

Helen McNaught @ AuntyHennys said...

I have the lil' twister and I have a Go Cutter.... so why haven't I made something like this???? That's all about to change now I've read your great post, so THANK YOU!

Have a great day:-)

Lisa in Port Hope said...

Thank you, this is very helpful. I was debating buying the tool and this makes it a lot more palatable to know that the scraps can be made usable.

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