Hi everybody, it’s Jenny from the MSQC. And I’ve got a really fun project for you
today. Take a look at this quilt behind me. Isn’t this fun? So we’re calling this
the Hashtag Quilt but you know if you’re my age, we call this the pound sign. So hashtag
or pound sign, I’m going to show you how to make this and it’s just quick and easy.
So to make this quilt what you’re going to need is one packet of ten inch squares.
And we’ve used the Pool Party Color Story and it’s by Kona for Robert Kaufman. And
it’s just a beautiful line, just absolutely gorgeous. You’re also going to need about
3 ½ yards of background fabric. And that includes all your little pieces and your border
as well. So let’s get to making this.
So when you go to make this quilt what you’re going to do is you’re going to take your
ten inch squares and you’re going to cut them into 1 ½ inch strips. Everything in
this quilt is just about 1 ½ inch strips. You’re going to cut the whole thing. So
I want to do that for you today so you can see how this goes together. Out of each ten
inch square you’re going to get two blocks, two separate hashtag blocks. So that’s kind
of fun. So we are just going to line this up right here and cut inch and a half squares
all the way across. Now I’m using my ruler to measure with, you can use either, your
ruler or your mat. And you just want to keep them together. Now you know usually when I
do these kind of blocks, I will stack up a few fabrics. And I would suggest until you
get going that you kind of do one at a time because with one, one ten inch square you’re
already getting two blocks, you’re liable to get them just a bit confused which, and
I tell you that’s what happened to me. So I got a bit confused. And I was like, Ok we’re
just going to go back and do one at a time.. Also with this color line there are a lot
color hues that are very close in color so you just want to watch that. Alright, so you
can see I have this little piece left over here that is the only waste that there is.
And I should have one, two, three, four, five, six of these. So you’re going to cut your
ten inch square into six of these little squares like this. You then need a 1 ½ inch strip
of your background fabric. So you’re going to take your background fabric and you’re
going to cut 1 ½ inch strips of that.
And then what we’re going to do is we’re going to take two of these and sew them right
onto this 1 ½ inch strip. And we’re going to, we’re going to sew a quarter of an inch
so we’ll head over to the sewing machine and do that. So I’m just going to lay my
presser foot right there on the edge. Make sure my needle is set at a, at a quarter of
an inch and sew down this side. I’m just going to lay another one right on the strip
so I can keep going. Alright now we’re going to go ahead and cut these apart. You want
to make sure that on the edge of your strip you don’t have your selvedge included. You
know go ahead and trim that off so you don’t accidentally sew that together. So then what
we’re going to do is I’m going to come over here to the iron. Set my seams so that
that thread just relaxes a bit. And then I’m going to roll this back. You want your seam
to stay to your color side particularly if you’re using white as your background fabric.
We don’t want that, those colors to pop up in between the others. So then you don’t
see them.
Alright so now what you do is you’re going to do is take these two and sew it together
just like this. So now we’re sewing those two pairs together. And we’re going to press
that open. So then what we’re going to do is we’re going to add one more piece on
here and that’s going to give us our whole strip set because what we’re doing is building
the strip set. Alrighty, quarter of an inch right down this side. And let’s trim that
or I mean iron that, sorry. We’re going to iron that back. We’re not trimming yet.
Alright this is the strip set you’re looking for. We’re looking for a white to blue,
white, blue, white. And it’s five strips. One, two, two blues and three whites. Then
we’re going to cut it again into 1 ½ inch strips. So I’m going to go ahead and, and
clean up this edge right here. And then we’re just going to come along here and cut these,
like this. And we’re going to cut the whole thing. We’re just going to, we’re just
going to keep cutting until we can’t cut anymore. All 1 ½. All of these are 1 ½ inches.
I didn’t remember if I told you that or not. They’re all 1 ½. I’m using my ruler
to line up the 1 ½ mark. And last one here. And this is our little bit of waste. That’s
it right there.
Alright so now we have these pieces. And what we’re going to do is we’re going to use
two of these to make our hashtag. So this is the way it’s going to look. It’s going
to go, we’re going to use three, I’m sorry, three strips right here. And we’re going
to sew these together and it’s going to make the hashtag. So let’s go ahead. And
we’re going to put, we’re going to take our solid blue and put our strip set on top
of it and sew that right on there. And we’re going to do that to two of them. So here’s
the first one. And I’m stopping and starting because I want to make sure all those seams
are laid down. And then we’re going to do it to the next one. Sew it down. And then
we’re going to trim these off. These have little tails on them. So we’re going to
trim of those tails right here. And these pieces, make sure you save those and put those
in a stack because we are going to use those later. So let’s trim off this one. We’re
going to press these open. Trim that string too. And I’m going to go ahead and set my
seam and roll that back. You want to make sure that you don’t have any little pleats
in your, in your strip sets as you’re ironing back. Make sure that that seam is all the
way open. So now we have this. We’re going to add one more piece in there and that’s
going to give us our hashtag. So we’ll take our two right here that have the strip set
on them. We’re going to sew those together. And then we’re going to add this strip set
to the outside edge. And we’re going to add one more here. Make sure that you get
that on the wrong side, I almost put that on the opposite side. Alright there we go.
We’re going to trim our threads off. And iron that open. I’m going to iron it first
and then trim I think.
So now you’ve got your hashtag all done. You just need to go ahead and trim it up.
Take off any little threads that are left in there. Just go ahead and you know, even
up those seams and make sure it’s just perfect, perfect. And you get two of these out of each
block. Now off camera I went ahead and sewed the other one together so you can see. We’ve
got the two of them and that’s your whole block. But there’s one more thing you need
to do. Let’s take a look at this sashing. Now you can see here we have sashed in between
every block but we did, we put a corner sashing on like this. So that it would, it would corner
each block. And then as you sew the blocks together it’s already sashed. So here’s
how we did that.
We took our background strip and we laid our square on here and sewed it down, quarter
of an inch. Let’s go to the machine and do that. So here we go. We’re just going
to sew this down. So you’re going to lay your, your hashtag right on that inch and
a half sashing strip. And we’re just going to sew it a quarter of an inch down. And then
when you get down here to the bottom, when you’re all done with that side, you can
actually just take it and use your scissor, use the edge of your block as a guide and
just cut right along that guide and you don’t even have to get up and cut if you don’t
want to. So then we’re going to go ahead and put the sashing on the other side as well.
So I’m just going to take this block and again lay it right down on my sashing strip
and sew it a quarter of an inch. So we’re doing one corner is what we’re doing. Sashing
just one corner. There we go. And again I’m just going to take this and trim it off with
my scissor just like this. Now we need to press them so they’re nice and flat. And
then I can show you how we lay them out. Alrighty.
So here we have some blocks, some sashing blocks that are already done. And you’ll
be able to see how we laid them out. So what I did was I set them, I set them in a row
just like this. Set the next, mixed my colors up. Set the next one right next to it just
like this. When you go to add this one you see that in between sashing is already done.
Here let me scoot this over here so you can see this a little better. Get that right in
front of that camera. There we go. Alright. So then, you can see, this makes the sashing
for this block. So as you go ahead and put your blocks together like this they’re going
to be all done and sashed as you go along. The only thing left to do then is you’re
going to add a sashing up here and a sashing on one side. You’re just going to have to
finish it off on one side. Now I know you’ve noticed that little border that’s back there.
And what I did with that was all the little end pieces that I cut off like this, I sewed
together end to end to end like this. You know me I don’t like waste. And made a little
pieced border to put in there. And we made it like a giant hashtag. And how you do that
is you’re going to put your side pieces on first. So these pieces right here, you
know, you’ll already have your inch and a half sashing all the way around your quilt.
We’re going to put this little strip in here and your wide border. And this is a 5
½ inch border out here. And you’re just going to sew that just on the side. So you
go from the center and sew the two side borders. Then you’re ready to cap it on the top.
We know this is a 5 ½ inch border so we have a 5 ½ inch square up here, then we put our
little strip. We put our middle piece across here. And then we put our little strip and
our 5 ½ inch square again. And it makes it like a giant hashtag. So it’s just really,
really fun. So I hope you enjoyed this tutorial on the Hashtag or the Pound Quilt from the
MSQC.