YoYo's

Cutting more yoyo's for the grand project! I decided to use my GO Baby with the circle die to cut them with.....and I am so glad that I did.....much quicker and it saves the hands from cramps!lol....since I am going to need 2500 of them this tool is going to come in handy.....and the waste is very little, really I am serious! I had read some comments that there was a lot of wastage when using the GO cutters.......I disagree and I have proof! (more on that later).....as I was saying I used the cutter to cut out more circles.....140 to be exact in a matter of minutes!

I had been cutting strips 5 1/2 inches by 5 1/2 inches to use....that was okay with little waste left over.....then I thought about using some 5 inch charms that I have had forever and a day just to see.....again I read on someones blog that you could not use them as they were too small......wrong again! and I will show you later in this post.....and using the 5 inch squares had very small, teeny tiny waste! I am not kidding.....I was so happy with the results that I had to post about it.....
 5 inch charm square over the large 5" circle die......

After running it through the GO Baby cutter......see how little the waste is!......

Close-up of what the circle looks like after going through the die.....notice that there are still a few pinked edges on the circle...it doesn't matter as that will be in the 1/4" that you turn under as you baste for the yoyo and will be hidden.....

 So to all the quilt police who say you cannot use the 5" charm squares......I am here to inform you that you need to go to jail yourself as you do not know what you are talking about.....stop scaring people into not using the cutter with 5" squares......Now mind that you have to make sure you lay the squares on the die properly in order to get these results......but I cut out 50 of the above circles with no problems and just a teeny amount of waste!.....well worth the experiment of trying what others say was not  possible....now you know that it can be done with great results.....now you can sew these together and they do come together quickly......someone asked if I was doing these by hand or using the clover yoyo maker.......I am doing these by hand.....I do have  a clover yoyo maker but you do have to use 5 1/2" squares to make them work....not only that, but I found the maker to be too fiddly for me.....I can hand sew and gather quicker by hand than I could with the yoyo maker, so that is the way I am doing it......if you want to use the yoyo maker you have to revert to hand cutting......and the funny thing is both ways turn out the same size yoyo! So I guess it comes down to which method you prefer...now back to my coverlet........while cutting out said circles I discovered that I had no where near the fabric I will need for this project.....as I am using jewel tones and bright prints for this project......no pale or soft colors here! So this project may take a bit longer than I thought to finish up.....but that is ok as I will make it a slow work in progress......I am going to try and cut all the fabric I have soon to see how many yoyo's I will be able to make before I have to buy......my hope was to only use what I have on hand, so we will see......this is what I have left to work with....these are fat quarters........

Another set of fat quarters.........

This is yardage......1yd....each......

 Hopefully I will put a large dent in the amount of yoyo's needed for this project.....I will give an update on the count after cutting all this fabric some time next week.....
Until next time,
Wendy