Hive 3 Tutorial for April

     This winter I participated in 30 quilt designs challenge 2017.  This was an Instagram challenge with my friend Sandra of Musings of a Menopausal Melon.  My second design was a block  based on a flag from Canada's history The Carignan Saliere flag. This drawing shows four blocks.

     I thought it would be fun to to use this block as my Stash Bee block.  In the drawing I made all the crosses the same colour but I thought for this quilt I would like it better if all the crosses where different colours.  I made 4 trial blocks to see the effect and I am very happy with them.

     As you can see the block is essentially a pinwheel block with a plus sign through the middle and I'm sure I'm not the only person to have arrived at this simple pattern.

     I'm planning to make a quilt for my niece from these blocks and I chose the colour palette from a hand woven couch throw that she bought for herself.  It's primarily off white with blue lines running through it and pops of red. The four blocks I made give you a good idea of the fabrics in the colour scheme but here are some others that would work.

  

     For the blues think any shade of blue that cold be considered denim blue from light to dark.  For the greys think blue greys.  I'm thinking that Emma would like it best if the quilt was predominantly blues and low volume fabrics with pops of red....but honestly make a block with whatever you have on hand.

     There are four 5 1/2 inch half square triangles used in the block construction.  You can make them with any technique you want but to keep it simple I made mine for the tutorial with the two at a time method.

Block Construction:

The block is made with two 6 1/4 inch squares of fabric A (blue in the photo below)

two 6 1/4 inch squares of fabric B (low volume in photo)

two 2 1/2 inch by 5 1/2 inch rectangles of C (red)

one 2 1/2 inch by 12 1/2 inch rectangle of fabric C

Pair each fabric A square with a fabric B square.  Place the squares right sides together and draw a line diagonally across the lighter square from corner to corner.

Sew parallel to this line 1/4 inch on each side, cut along the drawn line and press towards the darker fabric.   I'm assuming you know how to do this.  If not, Abigail has a great tutorial on her blog Cut and Alter explaining the technique.   Trim each of your half square triangle blocks to 5 1/2 inches square.

Align your half square triangle blocks and your fabric C rectangles like this.  Look I magically changed the fabric!

Sew the top row together.  Sew the bottom row together. Sew these to the opposite long sides of the 2 1/2 inch by 12 1/2 inch rectangle and you are done. Your block should finish at 12 1/2" square.  I hope you have fun making the block.  I'm looking forward to having them arrive in my mail box.