My biggest lesson has been to cut your strips from the width of the fabric not selvage to selvage. Selvage to selvage stretches--a lot. Not as much as bias, but enough to make your quilt wonky.
I've been putting together my latest BOM applique, and since I hand dyed the fabric, most of it is in more or less 1 yard sizes. Somethings (settings)work like that and some are going to work like that!
Best of luck!