fig3 specifically at step 102 the stitcher 10 is moved to a zero motion position and the accelerometer 52 is calibrated while the stitcher 10 is stationary the stitcher 10 is then operated at step 104 to stitch a pattern in the workpiece during the operation the stitch regulator 50 controls a number of stitches per inch that are stitched into the workpiece at step 106 a signal indicative of the stitcher 39 s acceleration with respect to the workpiece is received from the accelerometer 52 the signal is filtered with a low pass filter and sampling losses are removed therefrom at step 108 to determine an acceleration of the stitcher 10 in both the x axis and the y axis while the present invention is described with respect to both the x axis and the y axis as will be appreciated by one of ordinary skill in the art the signal may only be indicative of the stitcher 39 s acceleration in one of the x axis or the y axis at step 110 the acceleration signal is integrated to provide a vector velocity of the stitcher 10 in the x axis and the y axis wherein the vector velocities include both a magnitude and a direction the vector velocity in the x axis and the vector velocity in the y axis are summed at step 112 to provide a vector sum having both a magnitude and direction indicative of a velocity of the stitcher 10 with respect to the workpiece at step 114 it is determined.