Hourglass blocks

I am so pleased to be included in the Blog hop  by Carol Swift of Just Let Me Quilt.  I made 400 of these little blocks for a pattern.  And that is where the blocks sat. 

.  Now these blocks are 3 inches at this point and I kept making 10 matching blocks at a time. 

There is a pattern by Temecula Quilts and a quilt along from last year (Timeless Tidbits). And in case you couldn't tell, they are reproduction fabrics. I hope that doesn't turn you off to the process. 

Now, I have made these blocks before. And I will share my copied technique with you in case you want a  method to try.  Here is a video showing Pat Sloan making these blocks. ( I would rather you see it from an expert than have me recreate the process.)

 Pat Sloan making hourglass blocks.

Pat Sloan video on how to make the block.  from 8:34 to 12:46 shows how she  make them from half square triangles.

Here are piles of 10 prior to being trimmed with a ruler ( Cutting 5 squares of each color.)

This is the top I ended up making.   Colors not quite true to life.

So I am going to assume you understand that part and have or will see them from other bloggers. 

Instead I will show you some tricks I used to get my hourglass blocks together. My blocks are smaller. But I have found it is actually easier to work on smaller blocks. And then transfer the skill to larger ones. 

Here is a picture  showing how I carefully match the seams and pin them directly through one the center of both seams. It is very important to have both seam allowances going opposite directions. I will actually squeeze and wiggle  them together to "nest" them and make sure they the seams touch each other.  No gaps.

  

Then with the center point pinned straight down. I pin the seam allowances to the left through all the layers. The prevents them from shifting. 

I do remove the vertical pin when sewing. And I do keep pins in. But I also will sew on the machine slowly allowing the needle to slide one way or the other when it comes to the pin.  

I will also continue to squeeze the seams  together as I sew to keep the lengths of the blocks together prior to the ends of the blocks. 

Additionally, while pinning blocks I will try to have my intersections having the triangle corners align having the seam allowances facing opposite.  But you can't always get that. Some just have to be stacked on top of each other. 

I am not going to say this works 100 percent of the time. And I do frog the stitches and rip it, rip it, rip it. 

I also have some tricks for pressing seams. I assembled the quilt in blocks. 

First I would match pairs vertically, then twos to twos and so on until I got the width. ( mine was 10 blocks long)

Then prior to sewing I ironed each horizontal row one direction.

The first row is pressed to the left.

The second row is pressed to the right. And so forth down the rows. 

That way all the seam allowances are the same making the nesting  a little easier.

Here is shows pressing of the long rows OPEN.  There are just tooooo many layers of fabric in the corners. Think of it. 8 layers.  Ugh.  

Underneath the row is a tool called a Strip Stick. It is a padded area on top of a flat small like ruler stick that helps the seams to open and the underneath ( front side ) falls down a little. You press on top of it down the row.

And then move down the row. You can buy a long or short version. 

Then I repeatedly press on both sides, making sure to hopefully get the fabric as smooth as possible. 

                                                

  What else can you  do with these fabulous blocks?

Hourglass blocks make great setting blocks.  These are 2 color 5 inch blocks.

And since I only have 250 of my hourglass blocks left to play with from my original plan,  here is my next project with them.       4 blocks went together much easier. 

This block is in Pat Sloan's Sweet Dreams quilt along on Wednesdays ( a free block each Wednesday) 

Block 5 Sweet Dreams by Pat Sloan

Mine is so pretty in spring colors and each hourglass is only 3 inches finished.

No corners to match the diagonal lines. 

Other Hourglass bloggers today:

MooseStashQuilting

Becky’s Adventures in Quilting and Travel

The Darling Dogwood

Beaquilter

Quilting Gail

And of course, our hostess:  Just Let Me Quilt