TrueCut Tool Bundle

Working in quilt shops over the last 10 or more years. Quilters have always come in and ask which tools do I really need? I'm just a beginner and I need to have a rotary cutter. I need rulers, but I have no idea where to start. Well, the Grace company has put together a true cut bundle of tools that will fulfill most all of your quilting needs over the next quite a few years, we've got um a rotary cutter here.

This is our first thing we're going to highlight and there are a lot of rotary cutters on the market, but this one is designed to be used um with their ruler system with that has a rail or a lip along the edge and it has a guide that can keep your cutting nice and precise. Now, if you don't need that, there's the versatility of taking it off. So with a simple click of a finger, you can lay it down and take out the centerpiece. This is to be you, the small button one is for use with um that doesn't have a rail, the bumper or guide for using with the lip. You can easily switch it over to the one that's a little large, larger with a snap just like that.

And now there's a, um, a shield or a guide on there that will fit right along the ruler and you will have precise cutting every single time. Now, that is really good for those who are beginners. Maybe you're working with young kids and you're worried about that rotary cutter making a wave or going off in a direction and slipping. This keeps it in line. Also, if you have dexterity problems of holding that rotary cutter against the ruler, this will also help you in the, in the, in that case also, now there's one other really wonderful tip or um, feature of this rotary cutter is that eventually all of our blades get dull.

Well, true cut has blades available. Also that 45 millimeter blade is a rotary cutter is probably the most commonly used by quilters out there. And yes, the blades will eventually wear out. So they, um, can easily just slide off the end of the, um, handle and take out your next rotary blade. But this is the fun part as you have that lane there, you don't have to pick it up and maneuver it.

Um, with those sharp edges, all you need to do is lay your rotary cutter down and the magnetic system picks it right up off the table top. How perfect is that? Then you can just slide a centering to make sure that you can put that little button right in the center and you are off and ready to cut with a brand new blade. Now, most of us will delay on putting that new blade in until we're just about chewing through the fabric. So, you know who you are.

It's all of us, we always delay longer than we need to because we hate having to deal with sharp blades and getting them onto the handle. Now, they've a simple system of magnetic pick up and you're ready and back to cutting in a split second. So we've got our rotary blade and our guide in place. So let's look at the rulers that they have available. Now, the rulers are really sturdy.

They have rails on both of the long sides. Now, these are the rectangles that are available. Now, sometimes people say, oh, do I really need that really um long ruler? My answer is yes. Sadly, you do need something that will reach across a folded um, fabric from, from the fold to the salvage.

It helps us um to cut strips efficiently, quickly and with our most accurate, um most most accuracy, I guess when you start to fold the fabric up and use a shorter ruler to do that, you tend to get what we call a kink in your fabric because it's not perfectly um folded correctly and coming off the bolt folded, it will um be a nice clean cut across. So that 24 a half is probably the most versatile ruler you'll ever purchase. So the 24 a half by um this one is 6.5 wide. You're going to use it over and over and over again. So the go to ruler the next size down that probably is the go to for me is the 6.5 by 12.5.

It's very easy to do those smaller pieces trimming. Um You're, you're making um, strips that are for um smaller pieces, patchwork. You're lining up pieces, the 6.5 by 12 is not as clumsy because it's shorter to maneuver. Um It's really probably the second go to ruler that's gonna be in your, in your collection. Now, they've put this little sweet deal in with the three inch by 18, I believe.

Yes, 18. This is a perfect to work with fat quarters. You know, the fat quarters are 18 by 22. So this reaches across the fat quarter. The three inch width is really nice for sub cutting.

If you're making, you know, you've cut us a strip of 2.5, maybe, maybe you're using pre cutts and you have to cut that, you know, two nap and strip up into segments. Well, perfect. You don't have to use this a huge ruler for something like that to subcut. You just slip it along and subcut those strips easily. Also, I would think this would be really great for marking.

So say you're making place mats and you want to um mark cross hatching across a simple kind of machine quilting that a lot of quilters like to do um as a default. Well, the three inch wide, narrow like this is perfect, almost feels like a school um ruler when you were a kid, it's narrow enough to maneuver to easily mark off cross hatching and things like that. So the three uh are three by 18 inch ruler. So we've got this three set rectangles. Um Let's see, let's get, let's do a little bit with that or that lip along the edge of the ruler and show you how you can get that perfect cut every time because I know when I began as a quilter, um keeping that rotary cutter right up against the ruler was a little bit of a trick.

It, there's a nuance to how to hold it and get the kind of the muscle memory that it takes to um cut across. So with the fabric, because when I would get going, the rotary cutter would always want to kind of veer off in one direction, but you have to hold it against the ruler the whole way. But with this system, you can then just simply jump on to the lip of the ruler and all the way across. I don't even have to be looking at it and I am making a perfectly straight cut every time. So if you're a little distracted, you're still making straight lines.

Now, the other thing about these kinds of rulers is that um they are a light blue marking, which is a little bit easier on the ice for some people. Some uh other colors can be an issue and on seeing the lines, but with a black and light blue kind of a highlight to them, they can be seen on any color of fabric. And the other thing is they have created these to be chip resistant on the corners. And you know, just like I have at home, I have rulers that have the corner missing because I accidentally bounce them onto the floor. Well, chip resistant means that at least you have a chance, right?

So the corners will stay intact longer on these rulers. So the rectangular rulers great set to have available for all those strip kinds of projects. We're cutting borders, you're cutting shing all of those things that you need that long with the cross. Then there is included this bundle, a set of square rulers. And that question would come up with people in the quilt shop again.

But which of the square rulers do I need, do I need one of everything? Well, one of everything there is one for every inch increment out there, I believe. But my response always was you need a six or 6.5 So 6.5 inch square, an absolute go to for all those small projects, there's always something small that we're gonna need and you don't need a huge ruler for it. You just need something that you can maneuver quickly on small pieces. And then my next go to was always you have to have a 12.5 12.5 is the kind of the sweet spot of squares because your patchwork blocks a lot of times will finish 12 inches.

So 12.5 means all of your steam allowances are included. So you can trim blocks um setting blocks. This is kind of the sweet one to you to have. So between the 6.5 and the 12.5, the must have and square rulers to sweeten the deal, they've included the 9.5. So that one in between.

This is too small. This is too large is kind of like the three bears, you know, the which which chair fits best. Well, sometimes you need one in the middle too. So these will be the square rulers that you will um go to every single time. So the 6.5, the 9.5 and the 12.5 inch rulers.

And again, those have that raised lip on all four sides so that you can easily line up pieces. Um I suppose let's just pop this one open really? Quick here and I can also highlight the markings on there. Again, this has the black and the light blue markings so that it can easily be red on light colored fabrics as well as dark color fabrics. Because sometimes there, there's that combination or even in prints sometimes where we have a hard time seeing different um markings.

It also comes with that diagonal line marked out. So whenever you're working with half square triangles and you're wanting to trim something, you've got that half square or that 45 degree angle marked on there, nice and bright. And then of course, all of all down to the eighth, the fourth are there, but also the eighth because, you know, there's always that 78 inch block that we have to cut. So the square rulers from true cut, ready to go in that set. Now we have rulers.

Uh the other thing with the rulers, these are great for making, you know, of course, that's a nice straight cut. But what if you have an issue with a little bit of um shift in your ruler? Well, true grip came up with a solution for that too. And they have the true grip which can be applied to the backside of your rulers. So that and I get them off of here.

There they go. It's a lightweight little pad that's cut into circles like a donut and they can be applied to the, the wrong side of your rulers. These are really thin. Um There are other mechanisms out there that you can purchase to keep your ruler from shifting. But these are really fine.

So you don't get a rock in your ruler, you really want it to hold and um lay flat on your fabric. You don't want it to rock back and forth and these can be easily placed. I'll just go out to the corners here so that you can have that sure grip on your fabric because as quilters, it's all about accuracy and getting it just precise and that will prevent you from getting that shift. Let's see, put a piece of fabric out here and show how that will then grip right onto your fabric and you don't have the shift that, you know, a plastic ruler can slide. So if you do have any issues of keeping that in place, those really fine and they won't obstruct the markings, that's the nice part.

They're clear and they're really thin so that it doesn't raise them, the ruler up too far off of the surface. And you can see through them putting something on, on a ruler that obstructs the ability to align things is just defeats the purpose of accuracy. So they've designed them perfectly to hold in place not to obstruct your view. And the true are really a nice addition. If you have issues of holding that ruler in place.

Ok. There's also the, the sharpener out there that we've demoed before the, the True Sharp Two. And, um, with the fun tool that I really wanted to show you here at the end is that cutting circles has always been kind of a challenge for quilters. You know, how do we, how do we, do we cut out a template? Do we find something the right size and then, you know, trace around it.

How do we, then we have to cut it with the scissors or do we try to just work our way around a drawn line with a rotary cutter? But they have a cutting system out there that is, um, that creates perfect circles. So the true cut 3 60 is what it's called. This is what it looks like. It looks kind of like a thermometer in way, it has numbers on it.

It has dials. But once we look at all the bits and pieces of it, you'll see how easily it can be used on the top. Here, there's a button that at the bottom, there's kind of a cuff and it says lock and unlock on it. And if you turn to the arrow, it says unlock it loosens up and then this slides along kind of like what looks like the temperature gauge. But what we're doing is setting the width of our circle along the side.

There's like a ruler that goes from two inch up to 12.5 inches. So that would be the maximum it can go. So let's cut a six inch circle. So I'm sliding that knob to the little red dial underneath there lines up with the six and then I'm gonna lock it in place by twisting toward the lock direction to snug. So now when I swinging this later, it will make a six inch circle.

The other thing is that we need to see where is the cutting mechanism? Well, it's under this blue button. So we're gonna turn it over and it's under here, but it has a shield over it so that it has a guard that keeps on the blade from being exposed when not in use. So simply by pushing up a lever on the top, we can open this up and this is where the blade actually resides. If I pinch just the outer edge of this, it will reveal that there is a blade inside that mechanism and it is the same kind of blade that you find in a rotary cutter, but it's very small so that it can do that circular motion and give a nice clean cut.

Now, I'm gonna pop this back on just long enough so that we'll answer the question, what happens when the blade gets dull. Well, just like in your rotary cutter on the circle cutter, this mechanism, I pinch down just a little further, the whole case comes out and that holds the blade and you can just buy a new cartridge and pop it in and away. You go. So this tiny little piece then slides back into its place and snap. Then we're gonna take just the blade cover off now, so we can use it and then we have to place this entire portion back down until it clicks in place.

Now, let's get on a piece of fabric and see about cutting a circle. Get everything out of our way here. No, I have not tested how many layers I could cut at once. But if I can cut one nice circle, that's, that's what I'm really excited about because cutting circles has never been my forte. I try to cut a circle.

I'm pretty good with scissors until I get off the line. And then all of a sudden my circle has, it's like a flat tire. And if I can find something, they cut a nice precise circle, all the better. OK. So this portion I'm going to push down on because down and that's kind of the center of my circle.

There's a pin mechanism that comes out. I'll turn it over quick. Here. There's a tiny pin mechanism that comes out and it will swing on that as the center of the circle. And then, so I'm going to push down on this, but it also will allow me to rotate on that point.

So by pushing down here, I can swing around, I'm gonna switch hands and continue to push and then when I take it out, we should have a circle. A perfect circle. You could also use these for cutting yo circles for yoyos. How wonderful is that? You could even, this could be ready for applique.

You could do fusible, a applique. I believe that by putting a fusible on the back, you could cut through that too. But this is ready for um needle to applique or um any other application you want to do for circles. So from two inch to 12.5 inches, you have the perfect circle. So the true cut bundle of tools is available three different sizes of rectangular rulers, three sizes of square rulers.

There's the true grips, there's extra blades, the rotary cutter with the guide on it to work perfectly with your um true grip or true cut rulers and the circle cutter. How wonderful is that? Thanks for joining me.