Rainbows!

One project I'm working on (just started actually) is a Rainbow shadow box quilt like the one seen here:

From Flickr user Quilts by Elena

It is an offshoot of the Ravelry LSG Beginners Quilting Bee. I needed to cut fat quarters into 5" charm squares and thought I would post a tutorial on how to make the most out of your fat quarter (12 charm squares from 1 fat quarter) It's easy really, but cutting always proves to be one of my least favorite things about quilting. So here is how I made it quick and easy with minimal waste.

First, clip the tiniest corners off of your fat quarters and wash them. Take them out of the dryer while they are still damp, and immediately iron them.
Then, on to cutting.

1. Fold fat quarter in half, meeting short ends together.

2. Line up the fold on your cutting mat, and trim off raw edge on right.

3. Cut 3 sections that are 5" wide. You will have a bit of scrap here to add to your scrap bucket.

4. Stack your 3 pieces and line up all edges. Line up the long edge on your cutting mat. Cut the raw edge off the right side, and cut into 4 5" inch sections. This will give you 12 charm squares.

The amount of scrap you have at the end of this will depend on how well your fat quarter was cut to begin with. Mine were all from JoAnn's and some were perfect, and others were wonky and terrible. So in my illustrated example, I have very little scrap left because this fat quarter was wonky, but in others I had an inch or 2 extra to add to my scrap bucket. Now repeat these steps for as many fat quarters as you need to cut. In my case, I needed 10 different blue fabrics. I did 11 to be safe, because one or two of mine were questionable as far as tone on tone qualities. I wanted to provide an extra so that the other participants could eliminate one if they didn't like it. I also had 2 fat eighths (I think? basically half a fat quarter) so you actually see 12 fabrics here.

 

(note: the one that is 3rd from the right looks like white background here but is not. Blame strange lighting and iPhone pictures.) 

Keep your eyes pealed for the other rainbow colors that will be arriving in the next few weeks for this project!