What do you do with crooked fabric?
 

I'm cutting some I Spy charms for a swap. (Meanwhile, I'm struggling with how to improve my quilts, so I'm looking at everything carefully.) The fabric has been washed and pressed. Two of my fabrics have linear designs. (Birds in a row) Straightening the fabric the Leah Day way, it's appears to be printed crooked. The pattern is at least 1/2" off across the grain . You can see that the feet of the birds show on one side of the charm and they don't on the other. On an I Spy charm, it's not too noticeable. However, on some patterns, it could be really noticeable.

This is a name brand quilting fabric.

Do you cut with the grain and live with it looking crooked or do you cut with the pattern and live with it being crooked?

bkay

For an I Spy quilt, I would live with it being off grain.

ditto, gramajo

That just makes me crazy when it's crooked, especially when it's something that's so noticeable. If it were me, I'd cut it so the birds feet aren't cut off.

The only way to have the true grain line is to tear your fabric or pull a single thread out across the crosswise direction. Then, most often, you can tenter out the difference in the two sides as you hold it up along the fold by pulling on the fabric diagonally. Then you will know if the fabric is printed off register or not. With charms in an " I Spy" quilt it really does not make much difference. However, in applications it is very important. In those cases, if the fabric is indeed printed off register I cut my pieces to be visually perfect even if the grain is off. Most pieces are small enough or narrow enough to not be significant after the item is quilted. This used to be a very big issue in garment construction where grain line effects the hang of the garment.

I agree with Quilterpurpledog, when the fabric is crooked and it is blocks, or lines, or an animal figure out of the straight line, I cut it so that it goes with the other blocks. This is after trying the old way of ripping and it is still crooked.

We were taught many years ago in home Ec. to pull fabric on the diagonal both sides . Try and see if that helps. I have never had that happen.

I too would cut so that the picture was straight. I am finding, more and more, that I actually do not want a perfect straight of grain. Often it frays more because I think fabrics are not as tightly woven as they used to be. I had one top that I sashed with a black Kona cotton. I learned to cut slightly off grain because otherwise I could pull a loose thread and it would be as long as the whole width of the fabric. And boy did that fabric like to fray!!!

When I was fussy cutting for my quilt, I watched this video to straighten before I fussy cut it and it worked for me. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGt6_pWo6zs&t=766s

Thanks, Jcraine, the youtube video was informative. And yes, I remember (not fondly) from Jr. High School Home Ec class learning to straighten the fabric after you picked out a thread all the way across the grain.

bkay