It's been a while since I've mentioned my patchwork quilt here, and that's mostly because not much has happened since I sorted out the materials from my stash back in January. That's partly because life has been busy (when isn't it?) but also because I always find it hard to make the first cut.

When I chose my materials I thought I probably had enough of each material, but I wasn't sure. Because I'm using a mix of materials, including some old clothes I've cut up, it wasn't that simple. But with a couple of hours, renewed purpose and weather that encouraged me to stay inside, this weekend my well used rotary cutter and mat and I became reacquainted.

My well-used rotary cutter and cutting mat has been getting even more use this weekend

I've started to cut the 2.5 inch strips, from which I'll cut thirty squares. And yes, I'm using the floor which has been tough going on my knees even with a cushion. I've also learnt, or reminded myself that:

there's a lot more cutting to do,
I have plenty of material for this project, even from the clothes I cut up,
sewing projects require ironing, and that's before I've even started on any seams,
purpose bought material is easier to cut than repurposed clothes, mainly because it's already square.

I know that last one is pretty obvious, but using old clothes has meant more finickity cutting. I'm glad that when I arranged the materials in the basket by colours to see how they worked together, that somehow I also instinctively knew to mix them up so the upcycled fabric was interspersed with the purpose bought material. That's helped as after every more complicated cutting I know there's an easier one to come.

A pile of 2.5 inch wide strips, the first stage in cutting the squares I need for my patchwork quilt

I'm about halfway through cutting the materials and my next task is to iron these ready for cutting them into the thirty 2.5 inch squares I need. I'm not a big fan of ironing and it comes to something when I iron more for sewing projects than for clothes to wear, although in my defence I purposefully choose clothes that need less ironing, I mean if you can, why wouldn't you?

Once I have the squares then it'll be a case of working out how to place them - the interesting bit - and cutting out the plain, background squares and I've a feeling there's a lot of those. I'm not focusing on that number right now though and I'm hoping it won't be quite so tricky as I've an old duvet cover to use for that.

But first, back to the ironing, and more cutting...