I don't precut a whole project -- mainly because I have a tendency to get bored making blocks over and over again. I cut out a few and sew them, then I go back to cutting. Sometimes I make a quarter of the quilt and assemble it before I cut the blocks for the next quarter. Sometimes I decide I don't like the pattern enough to make the quilt so I do a table topper. About 10 years ago, I did a king size semi-scrappy quilt that I wanted to go from light to dark down and from left to right (like and ombre but there were 8 strip pieced HSTs in each block) and I cut and pieced one block at a time to make sure I got the right look. (No pattern, just something I played with -- I do that a lot)