Instagram can be a great chance to pick up tip from some very skilled people. I follow Dan Rouse (@dsrouse) on Instagram and as well as being an all round lovely person, I admire his work, his distinct individual style and the precision in his piecing. When he mentioned the Add-a quarter ruler in a recent pic with the comment " I don't know how I lived without it", I thought this might be something I need too. Justine at Simply Solids kindly offered to send me one to review and I said yes straightaway!
My usual go-to ruler for adding a quarter inch is a mini creative grids 1"x6" ruler. It is handy but I do risk slicing my fingers off from time to time as it is a little small. Justine sent me the larger Add-a-quarter which is 12" long- I believe the company make a mini 6" version too.
On the add-a quarter ruler, the numbered part is frosted and the quarter inch is clear and chunkier that the rest of the ruler with a lipped edge on the reverse side. This can slide against either a template, or a seam on foundation paper piecing and it holds in place really well- much better than my mini ruler!
You can see how thick the lipped edge is compared to a standard quilting ruler.
I am making the My Small World quilt at the moment and I am using templates for the majority of the pieces. I tested the Add-a-quarter ruler on adding a quarter inch border to the template pieces I am drawing on the reverse of fabric.
Pink on pink seemed to be a good test. The ruler is a simple but clever design. The thicker transparent edge is the part to focus on and I placed this so I could see the pencil line and then slid it so the line was just inside the frosted section and then I trimmed the fabric with a 28mm rotary cutter. As you can see, my fingers are safely out of the way and I can verify the ruler stayed put- no slipping or sliding. To be honest, when I posted a pic on Instagram, it seemed like everyone else already had one, or more than one and I am kicking myself for not having bought one sooner! I will be using this for foundation paper piecing which is what is is primarily designed for- trimming off all those excess seams to a quarter inch, but I found it idea for the many straight-line templates to add quarter inch borders to for the My Small World quilt along You can buy one at Simply Solids, thank you to Justine for sending me one, and thank you to Dan for the nudge too!
*Disclaimer* I was sent a free ruler to review by Justine at Simply Solids. All opinions are my own- it is a great gadget and you can read more about the Add-a-quarter ruler inventor and see how to use it for foundation piecing here. For social media fans, Simply Solids are offering a monthly competition on all purchases, just share with the hashtag #simplysolidsmakes for a chance to win a £25 voucher.
