Discover the essential sewing notions for garment making. Learn why they're crucial and what to substitute if you don't have them on hand.

Pressing your seams open is good for a lot of things, including precise piecing. Here are 3 reasons why:

'Bias' is a dirty word in quilting. I'm always amazed at the lengths quilters go to avoid working with a bias edge. This usually means a lot of extra steps and a LOT of extra work that is at distinct odds with my lazy quilting mentality. It's MUCH easier to just learn to manage the bias stretch. With some easy habits and some practice, you too can master those tricky bias edges. Here are 12 tips to manage the stretch. What is a bias edge? First thing's first, if you're not fa

The 4th and final section of this series is all about alignment methods: How to get those perfect points. Assuming you've cut, sewn, and pressed relatively accurately, this is the easy part. However, if you haven't cut, sewn, and pressed accurately, all is not lost. I'll be showing where and how to match points to get those perfect intersections every time. FYI: This post is part of a monthly series on precise piecing. If you haven't read Parts 1-3, make sure to check those

Curved piecing is scary. Somehow you're supposed to sew two curved edges together and end up with a flat piece. There's all this extra fabric and funny shapes. How on earth is this all supposed to work?!? Breath, my quilty friend. This is a case of the imagination being much worse than reality. With a couple of easy guidelines, you'll be sewing curves like a pro in no time. Contents: The general idea Cutting your pieces Trace then cut Straight edge guided cut Universal curv

Personally, I used to hate sewing half-square triangles (HSTs). There are some beautiful quilt patterns made almost exclusively from them, but the thought of sewing then trimming 400+ HSTs one-by-one sounded like agony. You could always just not trim them, but then matching points becomes almost impossible. That's when I discovered HSTs by the strip. While this method has been around for a while, it has never become super popular. Why? I have no idea because I think it's amaz

Don't you just love it when your points come together perfectly on the first try? It's not critical, but when it happens, it just gives you that little extra jolt of excitement and you feel like a boss! The only problem is that consistently getting precise points usually means slowing down a lot and doing a bunch of extra starching, trimming, and often seam ripping steps all of which zap the fun out of quilting. We'd all love perfect points every time, but the "lazy quilter"

While perfect points aren't necessary for a beautiful quilt, it's extra nice when everything lines up seamlessly. The best tip I have to achieve perfect points is the hang-pin technique. You may know it as the standing pin technique or a positioning pin; it goes by many names. I use it any time there are two points within blocks or units that I want to just kiss each other; no gap or blunting of the points. Read all the way to the end; the most important information is last!