Everything You Need to Know About Your New Madam Sew

12.5" Square Up Quilting Ruler!

Introduction

Using the Madam Sew 12.5” Square-Up Quilting Ruler will make squaring up your quilt blocks or half-square triangles (HSTs) easier and faster. You should square all of your quilt blocks to the same size before putting your quilt top together. Doing so will make it easier to match things up making your quilt project come together more accurately and resulting in a more square quilt top.

When you sew quilt blocks, units or even half-square triangles, they don’t all come out perfectly, at least not in our experience. It could be because your cutting wasn’t flawless, your sewing wasn’t straight, your seam allowance was a bit off or if you did decorative embroidery it might have misshaped your block.

Many quilters try to square up their quilt blocks with regular quilting rulers, such as a 6”x24” ruler, and a cutting mat as a guide. Others gather a bunch of square rulers for all of the sizes they are working on. So why this ruler? It’s designed so you just need one square up ruler or at most two…like a 6” square ruler and this one.

The following instructions will walk you through the steps to quickly and efficiently make all of your blocks match in size. But first some details on why this ruler is special.

• We’ve incorporated special bold lines at the 6.5”, 8.5”, 9.5” and 10.5” measurements and made our ruler 12.5” square.

  
  

  • These correspond to the popular finished block sizes of 6”, 8”, 9”, 10” and 12”.

    
    

    • The seam ¼” allowances you need when making these size blocks has already been incorporated into the guidelines so you don’t have to add them yourself.

      
      

• We included a 45 degree angle line to use when squaring up half-square triangles (HSTs).

  
  

• We included large numbers and ⅛ inch, ¼ inch, ½ inch and 1 inch markings so you can easily square-up other size blocks if needed. All you need is a little Washi Tape, as a visual guide…if you want, to help you along. And you get accuracy down to ⅛” with these clean and clear grid-lines.

• The ruler’s transparent matte technology allows you to see the ruler’s markings on both light and dark fabrics. This means no extra colors or markings to distract your eyes.

• Also included is an Anti-slip Cohetec Coating so you get the right amount of grip to help keep the ruler from sliding easily and the ability to move it effortlessly when needed.

  
  

To square up your quilt blocks for any of these finished block sizes, you will be using the corresponding, bold 6.5”, 8.5”, 9.5”, 10.5” lines or the entire ruler. For squaring up 12.5” blocks, the left and bottom edges of your ruler act as your guide. The instructions on how to do this are the same for each size.

Note: For our example we’ll be squaring up for 9” finished blocks. Your unfinished blocks need to be 9.5” square or a little larger before you start squaring up.

STEPS - Squaring up Blocks Using Preprinted Guidelines

• Press your block before squaring. Get it as flat as possible. We recommend using a wool pressing mat to help get that crisp, flat press.

  
  

• Find the 9.5” bold lines that run vertically and horizontally on the ruler. These lines are going to work as visual guides. We will be trimming two opposite corners each time we cut.

You might not be making a block that we included bold guidelines for on the Madam Sew 12.5” Square-Up Quilting Ruler and that’s okay.

For this example let's pretend you are making a finished 8.5” block.

 STEPS -Squaring Up Blocks When Not Using the Preprinted Guidelines

• You can either just use the lines on your ruler, keeping track of your chosen measurements yourself, or gather washi tape to help guide you.

  
  

  • NOTE: Washi tape is safer to use on your quilting ruler because it is not likely to damage it or to leave a residue. We recommend washi tape over painter’s or masking tape because both of those could damage your ruler. This advice is based on us actually testing all three on quilting rulers. For the rest of this step, we’ll proceed as if you are using the washi tape.

    
    

• Cut a piece of washi tape that is around half the length of the block you are squaring.

  
  

• Find the horizontal and vertical line that corresponds to the size block you are making, plus the ¼” seam allowance.

  
  

  • For our block that line will be the 9” line because the finished 8.5” block will need ¼” seam allowance all around.

    
    

  • Now also find where the two lines intersect.