Hive 9 June Block Tutorial

Hello! My name is Betsy and I live in sunny Florida. I learned how to quilt in 2007 and quilted for a few years and then put it down for a while but started back up in earnest in 2014 when I came across the modern quilting movement.

I thought about various blocks since this is my first time in a quilting bee and kept coming back to string pieced quilts. So, I'm asking you to make string pieced "X" block for me. Since my birthday is in July, I settled on a red/white/blue theme, with the red creating the "X".

 I'm looking for dark blues, saturated reds (more cool colored) and white whites (I prefer more gray to cream and it does not have to be solid). Scraps from our February and April blocks would be perfect.

There are a variety of string piecing tutorials so if you feel more comfortable using a different technique, go for it. I hope you have fun and don't overthink it too much.

Here is how I made my blocks:

For reference, I like to cut out a 8.5" square from regular paper so I can be sure that my pieced strings will be long enough since I don't use foundation piecing. There will be 4 squares total that will make up the "X" for a finished block of 16.5" square. I also recommend using strings that are a minimum of 1" wide and probably no more than 2.5" wide.

Here is the reference block and some strips I had on hand and others that I cut from various fat quarters.

Since this block is on point, the center needs to be a minimum of about 12.5" to make sure you have enough to cover the space.

Then grab another strip and sew it to the first using a 1/4 inch seam.

I just kept grabbing strips and sewing them together to do some random chain piecing:

I laid them out to make sure that they would cover the reference square:

Notice how this red strip isn't going to be long enough so I just grabbed another strip set and bumped the red further along so that it covered the reference block.

Just keep going until you have enough strips. I used a square up ruler to cut out my block but you can use your reference block to cut out the block.

One block:

Just repeat three more times to get your four parts of the "X":

Your finished "X" block should be 16.5 inches.

A few things to keep in mind: I found it easier to press my seams open as I went along to avoid additional bulk since there were quite a few seams in the block. When handling your blocks, be gentle since you will have bias edges.

Thank you and let me know if you have any questions.