Hi everybody, it’s Jenny from the MSQC. And I’ve got a fun project for you today. Let’s take a look at this quilt behind me. Isn’t this great? First of all I love this fabric. But this is our block right here and we are going to make this quilt quick and easy, so much fun. With a little surprise at the end. So to make this quilt what you’re going to need is two packs of five inch squares. And we’ve used Blue Carolina for Riley Blake. This is by Christopher Thompson. He’s also known as the Tattooed Quilter. He’s just a great guy. And of course I love blue and white. Now you’re going to need four fabrics of the same kind of make the block that we’re making. So this one has duplicates in it so look for one that has the duplicates. You’re also going to need two yards of background fabric. This is the white. And that includes this inner border. And this outer border is a five inch border and you’re going to need a yard of fabric for that. You’re going to need four yards and this is the backing that we’ve used. Isn’t that beautiful? I know four yards seems like a lot. And I get asked a lot of backing questions. But you have to go by the width of the quilt. And our quilt is 61 so two yards is 72 but it’s only forty inches wide but you have to add another piece because we’ve horizontally pieced it. So four yards is what you need for the back of this. So let me show you how to make this because this is really fun.

First of all you’re going to select four charms that are the same. And we have to cut them in different ways. So what we’re going to do is I’m going to line up two charms like this. And I’m going to cut two of those in half. So let’s just use this little ruler right here. We’re going to cut these right in half because you need four bars like this. And we’re going to, one of our squares is going to be four 2 ½ inch squares. So we’re going to cut this one like this. And then our center square over here is 4 ½ inches so we need to cut it down. So I’m going to lay my ruler here on the 4 ½ right there. And I’m just going to trim these two sides like this. Now you also need some white fabric for this. And you’re going to need some 2 ½ inch squares and you’re going to need some 4 ½ inch squares right here. So we’re going to take our 2 ½ inch squares and we are going to sew them to our colored 2 ½ inch squares like this. So four of those, we’re going to count out four. One, two, three, four, and we’re going to go to the sewing machine and we’re going to attach these two together. And, and it doesn’t matter what side you put them on. Just run them through. Go ahead and chain piece them. And I’m just going to start right here. I’ve got my color on the bottom, the white on the top, that’s not going to really matter. Alright. So we’re going to press these open. And I’m going to press, put my dark sides to the top, seam at the top and then I can just roll them back. I’m going to set all my seams this way. And then just press them back and press them back and press them back. And one more. Oh look how cute that one centered up. The design is right in the center. Alright.

So now what we’re going to do is we’re going to attach these to a, each one of these gets attached to a bar. And this you want to make sure goes the same direction. Now when we sew our seam here these become 4 ½ so we need to cut a little half inch off the bottom of our blocks here so that they’re going to be a 4 ½ by 2 ½ inch rectangle. And I’m just going to stack those right there and cut a little half an inch off the bottom. You can actually sew them on and trim them off after you get them sewn, either way will work. And we’re going to put these together. Now when you go to the sewing machine you want to make sure this is always the same. So you want to make sure this color is always at the top. And you lay this one on top of it. So you know sometimes things matter and sometimes they don’t. Usually I go through and just sew them up to see what’s going to happen and that was something I learned rather quickly. So we’re going to go ahead and chain piece these. So there’s one. And let me grab this. Make sure your seams lays to the dark. We don’t have to line up any seams when we’re doing this. And, and the last one right here. I can’t believe how centered up that little bouquet of flowers is. That is really cute. Alright now let’s go press these open. And here we go. We’ve got four little, four little ones there. And now we get to put our block together.

Now this is the block we’re working on right here, that looks like this. It’s got four corners. So it’s basically a nine patch. And these are our little corner blocks. And what you want to remember on these is that this white block goes to the center on all four sides. So here’s our center block. Here’s our corners. And then we’re going to take our white 4 ½ inch block and set it right in the spaces that are left. So just like this. So we’re going to sew these together in rows of three. So let’s go over here to the sewing machine and we’ll sew. We’ll just pick it up a row at a time. And make sure, there we go. Just lining everything up. Oh this goes on the other side. I was like, wait what do I sew this to. I’m so used to chain piecing. So when you put these together, again make sure the white touches the white. And there’s our first row. The center row is just these three big squares sewn together. So we’re going to do that. I’m just going to flip this around and open it up. Make sure my color stays in the middle. And sew this one on the other side. That’s our center row. And let’s go to the third row here. And don’t forget again, the white goes to the center. You know I have to do these little mantras because I get so mixed up so I have to make sure that I have these little mantras. It’s like, white to the center, white to the white. Just to make sure, otherwise I get turned around. And then once I make a block I literally set that block right here and look at it every step of the way. Alright now we’re going to sew these three rows together like this. And you just have to match up at your seam lines. So make your seams go the way you want them to. I did not press in between. I probably should have. But I’m going to make mine, make my inner seam go in and my colored seam go toward the colored and the white go to the white. And we’ll add that last row. Again making sure my whites are to the inside. And I’m going to make sure this is tucked under there. Sometimes I get in a hurry and I just forget to iron. It is always better to iron each piece. I just want to say that right now, it’s always better. So we’re heading over here. Oh that looks pretty good. So I’m pressing down this top now. I’m going to flip it over and make my seams go the way I want them to. So I want them this one to go up and these to go out and the center one to go in. And these to go out. Give that a little shot of steam. Alrighty.

So this is our block right here. How fast was that? Isn’t that fun? So now when we sew them together, we’re just going to sew them together in rows like this. And we’re just going to butt them right up next to each other. That’s what makes this little secondary block down here. So we’re going to put this here. And we’re just going to do them, butt them together in rows like this. Now let’s look at our quilt. We have one, two, three, four, across. And one, two, three, four, down. One, two, three, four, yep. So four by four. And it makes this. This is your little secondary block right here. So this is the secondary block that you get right here. And the secondary block is what happens when you put the blocks together. It’s the new pattern that appears. And I think this is a pretty cool secondary block.

So I made this quilt and I’m looking at it and I’m looking at it and I’m seeing this block right here. And it’s got such nice big wide open spaces. And I got thinking what happens if I cut this up. What happens if I cut this up? So I had a whole bunch of scrappy pieces left over. I didn’t have four of the same. I just had scraps. So I made another block like this. It’s all the leftover pieces that I didn’t have. You know I didn’t have four whole ones of. So I just made a block like this and I cut it up. Let me show you what happens. This is so cool. So I put my ruler on here and I’m going to come in 2 ¼. Let me measure this. No, oh you know, good. I’m glad I stopped because this is a 4 ½ inch block which is going to when you lose your quarter of an inch seam it’s going to be four, a total of four. So we’re going to come two inches. You have to half that when you’re cutting that in half. Two inches from the side seam. And we’re going to cut that right down the middle. So honestly you can just, you know, check your middle, make a cut. Check your middle right here and make a cut. We’re cutting it directly in half. And look how cute this is. Look at this block. How fun is that? Just from cutting it up. So then you’re going to take these and I just turned two opposite corners to the middle like this. Look how cut that is. Isn’t that darling? So of course I took all of my leftovers and I made another quilt. Take a look at this. Isn’t this fun? Look how cute this is. It’s so great. It’s so much fun. And I just love this fabric.

I got to spend some time with Christopher when he was at here at Missouri Star Academy. He’s also known as the Tattooed Quilter. And it was just great getting to know him. One of the things I want to mention is that on some of his fabric, you can see right here. He has a little French bulldog. And he does the little bulldog motif on his fabric. It’s just so cute. So we’re calling this the Grand Square right here. This is the Grand Square. And this one is called Do Si Do because we just moved it around. So we hope you enjoyed this tutorial from the MSQC.