Thursday, July 7, 2011

Can't live without it- part 5

Every quilter needs an acrylic ruler. They vary in size and dimension, but inevitably you will buy one. Welll...maybe not. My mom used a angle arm used for construction or a yard stick. They work, they are cheap, but I simply can't live without my ruler.

So I am going to list things that people use with their rulers to cut and measure fabric and then I am going to post my seriously amazing ruler. Once you have a ruler you will want a rotary cutter. Scissors work fine, but man a rotary cutter just saves soooooooooooo much time. Many people buy one of those hand grips to keep the ruler in place so it doesn't slip on the ruler. Many people buy several sized rulers for various projects. I can honestly say that I do have two other rulers besides this one but this is I think the best size for having just one if you want just one.

Here is my Fiskars 6 1/2" by 24" cutter/ruler
The things that I like about my ruler are
1. It has a rotary cutter attached.
2. It used the same size blade as most rotary cutters
3. The edge with the cutter attached is heavy, unbending and easy to grab
4. The size.

Because of the heavy and easy to grab side I would never need a hand grabbing attachment. It makes it so it won't bend. I have seen people brake their acrylic rulers just because it bent too much. I don't have to carry around my rotary cutter with me, just my ruler which is really nice.

ya, I simply can't live without it. I bought it at Walmart in the craft section. I have not seen it anywhere else..ie JoAnn's, Michaels, Hobby Lobby, Robert's Arts and Crafts... I looked every where for one when i was looking for it. My friend introduced me to hers about 4 years ago and I knew that that was the ruler for me. The first few times that I used it, there was a sticky pad on the bottom part of the cutting side that is no longer sticky but made it even more firm at the time. After doing a quick internet search I couldn't find it anywhere. Hm..when I find a link to somewhere you can buy it, I will post a link.

Besides this ruler I also have two other acrylic rulers- a 6 1/2" square and a 2 1/2" square. I bought those because I make a lot of small block things and it is nice to just have a square esp. the smallest one. I am currently considering buying a circle acrylic set for my newest projects and that would be more of a template ruler than an everyday functioning ruler.

Well hope that you enjoyed my ramblings on one of my favorite tools.

3 comments:

Karen said...

I found one of these for a few dollars at a garage sale a few weeks ago. I just need to change the blade. I'm excited to use it now!

Amalie said...

that is super awesome!!! No better place to find one. With how much levi I cut I probably change my blade..hm every six months. I probably should do it more often but just don't I just deal with it until it is almost completely dull.

Roseanne said...

What a great idea I will have to look in to that. I think that they are used a lot for scrapbooking.