Tool Time with Mary and her NINE DEGREE ruler. yes....LOVING THIS RULER!

Lets talk Tools

At Madame Samm's invitation, this is

Mary on Lake Pulaski checking back in with you on your Nine Degree Ruler!

Remember I was a guest here at Sew We Quilt on December 2nd

to show you this:

Well did you buy a Nine Degree Ruler or have one already?  Now I'm back to show you another way you can use your Nine Degree Ruler. 

Let's make a round tablecloth (or it could be a baby playmat or a tree skirt).

This time, I went to my scrap bin and "made" fabric all out of the scraps.  My friend Victoria of Bumble Beans taught me how to do this at a retreat a few years ago. 

I simply take my scraps and sew them together, trim to 1/4 inch seam, press open and continue until I get a large enough piece to cut out what I need:

I used everything; no worry about what went together.  Here I am checking to make sure the piece is large enough to cut wedges with the the 25 inch Nine Degree Ruler.

Since lots of the edges are on the bias, I use spray starch when I press all the seams open.

Here I start cutting getting as many wedges as I can out of each pieced fabric section.

 

 I needed 20 of the pieced wedges and 20 solid color wedges.  I chose white Kona for my solid.

Carefully stack your print wedges to not distort the cut edges.

Sew a solid wedge to each print wedge and carefully press each seam open.

 

 I continued until I had 10 pieces sewn together and then checked to be sure the edges forms a 90 degree angle and adjusted my seams if necessary.

I sewed another section of 10 and measure again.  Then I sewed the two sections together and made sure it formed a straight line.  I did the same with the other two sections.

Here is the whole circle sewn together.

Next I filled in the center hole and again used my scraps. 

 And here is my finished tablecloth out of scraps:

Edit:  I backed the circle with a solid from my stash.

Instead of quilt this tablecloth that I wanted to stay soft and drape, I stitched in the ditch on both sides of each pieced wedge. I then added a turquoise and white striped bias binding.

The end result is a 50 inch circle.

Stop over at my blog Mary on Lake Pulaski and see what else I'm up to.