Step 1: Cutting for Hand Piecing

The way you cut your fabric is a major difference between hand-piecing and machine-piecing. For hand-piecing, the first step is to cut out templates. 

These templates should be the size of your finished squares.  In this case my block consists entirely of 5-inch squares and 2 1/2-inch squares. I carefully measured and cut one 5 inch square and one 2 1/2 inch square out of template plastic.

I then traced the template on the wrong side of my fabric with a fabric pen. These markings will be the lines that I actually sew on.

After tracing the templates I cut the fabric using shears.  Cut roughly 1/4-inch outside the mark so they looked like this.

 

To make this mini quilt, you'll need to cut out:

2 small solid squares,

2 small print squares,

4 large solid squares in a different color, and

4 large print squares.

Here they all are, cut out and ready for business: