Accuracy has always been an elusive target for me in my quilting. When sewing clothing, and a 5/8″ seam allowance, you need to be accurate but it’s a little open to interpretation. In quilting, with only a 1/4″ seam allowance, and a lot of seams in a block or quilt, little things get really magnified.

The whole process can snowball too. If your block is made up of components, and your seam allowances are off in the component, then when you combine components, that will be off, and when you assemble blocks, those won’t be the right size, and so on and so on. It can get to be a really ugly situation. I am learning that the way to more accuracy is to measure and trim up as I go, ensuring that components are the right size, and blocks are the right size.

For example, most of the methods for making half square triangles leave room for inaccuracy to creep in. Some methods more than others, but that’s a story for another post. If I make my half square triangles and immediately swing into assembling those into components or blocks, it’s going to be tricky to get the blocks the right size. So now I make my half square triangles and square them up. I do the same thing with hour glass blocks. Pretty much anything with a bias seam in it, is going to get squared up. The most useful ruler I’ve found to do that is the Precision Trimmer. It’s got block sizes from 1″ to 6″ finished, with lots of extra registration lines so you can make sure that not only are things the right size but also squared up. Yes I have made a lot of parallelograms in my quilting career.

I still work on accuracy. I have a feeling I will always be working on accuracy but my precision trimmer helps tremendously!