Hive 1 August Tutorial -- Sorta Wonky Hashtag Block

 Hi, I'm Pam in Hive 1, and this is my 9th year participating in Stashbee.  I've loved every quilt I've made with my Stashbee blocks--it's so amazing seeing the variety of designs and fabrics I could never achieve using my own very small stash.

I've wanted to make a hashtag quilt for a while, but wasn't feeling the measuring and seam-matching, so I decided to make a slightly wonky and easier, faster version. I love the look of a quilt where the blocks are all a bit different, even if the concept is the same for all of them.  

Here are the directions for my version of the hashtag block:

Fabrics:     One 12.5 inch square of dark grey or black fabric, either solid or print, for the background.

                  Four 1.25 inch strips of bright (print or solid) fabrics, at least 14 inches long

Assembly:    Using a ruler and rotary cutter, make a cut off one side of the background square.  No rules for where to make the cut, and it can be parallel to the edge or slightly at an angle as I did with my sample blocks. 

Take one of your bright strips, and sew it into the square, using a 1/4 inch seam allowance.  I sewed the strip onto the bigger background piece first, and then sewed the smaller background piece onto the strip, but it doesn't matter what order you do this.  I pressed my seams toward the strip, but however you want to press is fine.

Don't worry about the edges of the background square lining up perfectly on both sides of the strip.

Next make another slice on another side of the square, and insert the next strip the same way.

Strip number one won't line up perfectly on both sides of strip number two, and that's okay.

Continue to slice and insert two more strips the same way.

Yay, you're done!  PLEASE DO NOT "SQUARE UP" THE BLOCK!!  

The block will be roughly 13.5 inches square, but the edges are not going to be straight or parallel, and THAT'S OKAY.  The blocks are not all going to be the same size, and I can trim them to a uniform size before I assemble the quilt top.  If you can't stand those overhanging strips, roughly cut the excess off, but don't trim down the crooked edges of the block. 

THANKS AND ENJOY!