Charming Triangles ~ Progress

I am making good progress with my lastest project ~ the Charming Triangles Quilt. The Half Square Triangles just keep coming although I am wishing that I had made a whole stack of HST prior to commencing the piecing. Making blocks in small batches seems to be stretching out the whole process and is testing the HST friendship.

For those of you interested in the nitty gritty:

• The center panel is a hand printed panel by Prints Charming and was trimmed back to measure 17 inches x 17 inches.  Of course you can substitute any of your favorite prints ~ think large scale floral prints or even fun novelty and kids prints.
• To make half square triangles ~ start with two 5 inch squares, one white, one red.

Follow above diagram:

Use pencil to mark white square with diagonal line.

Sandwich the two squares right sides together - stitch 1/4 inch seam on either side of diagonal line.

Cut apart on pencil line

Press seam allowance toward the red fabric.

AND

Trim the HST back to an exact 4 1/2 inch square.

Repeat until you have enough HSTs.

• I am a trimmer, I do oversize the blocks and trim back to exact size.  Although it takes extra time, it does mean that your HST is really accurate, and certainly allows for easy piecing when joining all the blocks into rows and then when sewing rows together into a quilt top.  

• To set the center panel on point, first make a  corner set of half square triangles to "square up" the panel.  For each corner you will need 3 HST plus 3 white triangles (cut a 5 inch square on the diagonal).  Sew together as pictured above.

From here you can continue to add rows of HST to top/bottom and sides.  Keep going until you are happy with the size of your quilt top.

The above pictured quilt top consists of 120 half square triangles and the center panel.  I have since added two more rows of HSTs to the top and bottom of the quilt top.  My quilt top now measures 48 inches x 64 inches ~ 168 HST.

Now basting,
Rita