My machine likes to eat the beginning edge of fabric when I start to sew and I will put pairs of squares or HSTs on the sewing line first to feed my chain piecing and I do one at the end of the line to. I leave the last one on the machine to be the leader for the next round of sewing.
If you make snowballs or flying geese you can accumulate lots of small HSTs from cutting off the corners. These are ready to use as L&Es and are perfect for mini quilts. Here is a sample of a mini made from these little "throw-a-ways". The HSTs are about 1.25" sq.
This whole quilt was made from scraps of other quilts.
peace
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