DIY Quilting Ruler Holder

I’ve been making a LOT of quilts lately with babies on the way and some long over due one for the other grand-kids. And in doing so, I’ve been using a LOT of my various rulers.  Issue is, I really don’t have a good storing system for most of them.  I have Quilting Rulers, Template Rulers, Cutting Rulers… and on and on.  I by no means have as many as most quilters, but I do use what I have consistently.  Such a pain to figure out where to store them so they are handy when I want to use them.

Currently I have the majority of smaller ones in a plastic letter holder on my shelf above the ironing table and that works for most of them, but not the larger ones and the smaller ones get lost in there.  I store my larger ones on little command hooks to the side of my cutting table.   Those are my most frequent used and that works for me very well. But that doesn’t work for my 16 1/2″ Square one which I use for squaring off quilt blocks. Need something to hold them all except for the long cutting ones I use daily.

I searched for something on the internet and found several for sale at various places.  Huh… well, for about $2 of wood, and maybe an hour of time, I can make couple! So I went to designing a couple that would fit my personal work space. 🙂  Now, nothing against the person who makes these and sells, but come on! $42?!

And the ones that store on the wall won’t do as my walls are filled with no room to spare.

So here is my design.  I did this up in 3D in my CAD program so I can show the Mr on sizes I want.

My quilting foot rulers are thicker, about 3/8″+.  My template rulers and cutting rulers are about 1/8″-1/4″ thick.  I only need maybe one slot or two for the quilting foot rulers, so the rest of the slots can be narrower so I can fit more slots.  I figure a 2×10 piece of wood would work well, (we have several in the garage just waiting for a purpose… this does NOT help my anti-hoarding speech I give the Mr monthly. LOL ). Has enough weight to hold my largest rulers and enough depth.  That’s the nominal size so in reality it’s 9 1/2″ x 1 1/2″.  Cutting it to be 18″ long should work well. Then I can store it on the shelf above the table all within easy reach.

First slot should be 1/2″ wide and rest can be 3/8″ wide with 1/2″ to 5/8″ between slots. Or 1″ from front to front of the slots.  This gives me plenty of room between to store my instruction sheets with the rulers between the slots for the specialty rulers I have too.  Make it 3/4″ deep and give them a slight angle towards the back to hold the rulers in place to lean towards the rear.

Pretty simple yes?  I think so.  I can stain it and seal it up with a spray polyurethane to make it nice looking and easy to clean.

And if better half wants to get real ambitious. We can make it into a stand easily by cutting a 45 degree angle on the front and the slots angled same and adding a piece of wood to the back to hold it up like an easel. 🙂 But I’d be happy with either one honestly.

OK, back to work, (play time really), for me.  Have two baby quilts to finish up and another one is in the cutting stage half done.  Need to cut and iron a ton of 20″ background squares and waiting on the remainder of the fabric to arrive to cut the rest of the quilt.  Ordered all same day, shipped from same place… but coming a week apart. Go figure. LOL

Want a peak at one of them? I plan on writing up the directions for this one and posting. I’m calling it Grayson’s Block after the very special soon to be born baby boy I’m making it for. I’m really loving it and think I may have to do a larger one too.  This is crib sized. Looks greener in the photo than I think it is.  Has more of a teal green coloring.  Inspiration came from traditional blocks cut up and reorganized to create bigger blocks.  Don’t think I’ve made a traditional 12″ square blocked quilt in 30 years plus. LOL 

Can you tell I need a bigger Design wall or more of them? LOL Had to roll up my plane quilt temporarily while working on these. BUT, I have a plan for that.  Ordered some fleece and going to add a roll up design wall! Hopefully when we move I will have the room space of my dreams. 😉 And that perfect LED lighting the Mr has promised me. That or I’m taking over that living room and dining room downstairs being unused. LOL

And I still need to finish quilting my own bed quilt… been hanging over the stair railing for a few months now. Got frustrated with my sewing machine and table trying to do such a large quilt and needed a break… one day… one day maybe I can get a long arm quilting machine. Sigh… still dreaming. But with the price being about the same as car… I have to keep my priorities in check. Besides… need that bigger Studio first. 😉 All in the plans for our new homestead.

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