Hi everybody, it’s Jenny from the MSQC. And I’ve got a great project for you today. Today I’m going to talk about putting blocks on point, how to set them on point and how to do it. So let’s take a look at this quilt behind me. Isn’t this fun? These are all little nine patches. And just setting on point gives them a little bit of pizzazz. So I love this fabric. This is so cute. This is fabric by Amy Smart. Let me see what it’s called. It’s called Gingham Girls by Amy Smart for Riley Blake. And it’s just darling. So all the girls who sew for me, they could hardly wait for this to come out in a daily deal. They are loving this. So to make this quilt what you’re going to need is one roll of 2 ½ inch strips. And again we’ve used this cute Gingham Girls by Amy Smart. You’re also going to need, your background is 3 ½ yards of background fabric. We’ve got an inner border here that is ¾ of a yard. Our outer border is going to be a yard and a half. And this is a 6 ½ inch outer border. And then your back right here. This is 5 ½ yards of fabric for your back. And it’s the same that we used on that little inner border. So it’s just a darling, darling quilt. It makes a quilt that is about 75 by 84 so it’s a good size quilt. And we used nine patch blocks. Now the nine patch is an easy block. We’ve made it before. I’m going to quickly go through it again but my point for making this video is so you can see how to set any block that you make on point.

Now on point is when you take a regular block like this and you turn it this way so the point comes down on the bottom. Normally on point blocks are set in rows that go diagonally but by putting our squares around this we’re going to set this so we can again use straight seams but the block turns but not our sewing. So it’s still easy for us. I know that sounded a little weird but hopefully I’ll clear it up as we go along. So let’s quickly go through the nine patch. Now the nine patch, what you’re going to do is you’re going to take two strips of your color and sew them to one strip of white, for one strip set. For your second strip set you’re going to sew two strips of white with one color in the middle. Now when you do that we’re going to cut these into segments. And I’m just going to line them up. I’m going to cut them together. First thing I’m going to do right here is I’m going to trim of this selvedge edge. So I’m going to make sure this is sticking out here beyond my ½ inch mark. And I’m just going to trim that off. Alright, now I’m going to come in and I love this little 2 ½ inch ruler just for this so you can lay it right on the edge and just cut your pieces. And you’re going to need two outer pieces to one inner piece for this block so let me show you what I’m talking about here. So we’ve got these two right here. And I’m going to swap those around. And we’re going to put this one in the middle. It makes this little block like this called the nine patch. We’re going to stitch this together. On the, one this block I want to point this out. On the block where it has two whites and one reds, it’s ironed to the center. On this block here where we’ve got the two colors, it’s ironed out so when we’re ready to sew those together they just nest up nicely. So let’s go and sew these together real quick. The nine patch really is one of my favorites. I love the nine patch block. It’s just so, I mean you can do it scrappy, you can do it with strips, you can just, anything you’d like. It just makes a beautiful block. Alright let’s sew the other side on here. Let see what we have. We’ve put these two together and then we’re going to sew this other side on here. And make sure they nest. I’m feeling for that seam for no space in between. There we go. And I’m going to come over here and iron this. That looks pretty good. And I’m just going to kind of roll it back and give it a shot of steam and it will lay nice and flat. So this is our nine patch.

Now it’s a super easy block to make, quick and I know you’ll love doing it as much as I do. So let me show you now how to set this on point. What I want you to remember about this. And I’m just trimming this up as we’re talking. But what I want you to remember about this is this method is going to make it so you can set any block you want on point, ok? So what I’m going to do here is I’m going to measure this block. And I know that this block is 6 ½. So then I’m going to cut a square out of my background fabric that’s exactly 6 ½. I’m going to use two of those squares because what I’m going to do is I”m going to take my two squares that are the same size as this one. Now as you get playing with this you’ll be able to adjust your measurements a little bit but this is just an easy quick way to do it so that it works for every block. So now what I’m going to do is I have these two squares and I am going to cut them diagonally both directions. So my squares again were the same size. And now I have four of these little pieces. So then what we’re going to do is we’re going to take this right here and we’re going to attach these four pieces to it. So I’ll attach top and bottom, side and side like this. And what that does is it changes the direction of the block from sitting straight, all of a sudden now your block goes like this. And that block has been popped on point.

So let me again go ahead and show you how I did this so I’m going to take my two squares. And I’m going to find a little middle spot right here. Just fold it in half and give it a crease with my thumb nail. And then I’m going to do the same on here. I’m going to fold this in half and give it a little crease. And that tells me right where to line it up. And one of the things you’ll notice on this is that, is that there are, I mean there’s lots of methods of doing this. And you will probably be able to cut down your fabric. I think a lot of times what they naturally do is take it down about ½ an inch, cut a block that’s a ½ an inch smaller. But, I you know, I’m all about easy and so this was easy to me. Two blocks the same size. We’re going to line them up like that. We’re going to sew a quarter of an inch right down the sides. Because then you can actually trim up your block to any size you want. So I’m going to sew this a quarter of an inch . And then I’m going to come out here on this edge and sew the other one a quarter of an inch. And for those of you, you know, for those of you who are doing this for the first time this, this is just an easy way to do it. And I love it when you can take a little block and when you turn it on point it looks completely different than just the straight set up way.

Alright so now I have these two on, I’m going to do the same thing to this other side over here. Find my middles and find my middle over here. And attach it to the middles on this side. Make sure we’re in the middle there. There we go. Now we’re going to lay these two on here like this. And you’ll notice they come all the way across those two points right there which is what we want. And this one. Oops, there we go. I’ve got those nice nails you know. Alright so see how this one comes clear across? That’s what you want. You want about a quarter of an inch on either side of your triangles. And that makes your whole block. So we’ll just quarter of an inch this down the side. And one more time over here. Alrighty. So now, the benefit of doing it this way is that if you need to square it up at all, you have plenty of room. So I’m just going to iron this back just like this. Whoops I’ve got a little rumple over here. Let me steam that out.

Alright so now what I’m going to do is I’m going to square up my block. Which means I’m just going to take my ruler and I’m going to line it up so that it hits on that, this little seam right here. Make sure you have plenty for you seam line. I’m actually putting my half inch mark on that edge, right here on my block. So I’m just trimming off a little. But it’s going to give me a nice square block. And I didn’t have to stress over it. And one more side. Look how clean and pretty that looks. There we go. Alrighty. So look now you have this perfect little block. So now all you have to do is do that to all of yours. And then we’re going to get to set them together.

So let’s take a look at how we did this because now you have an on point block and you get to sew it together in rows just like this. As you make your second row it’s going to come together like this. You see how cool that is. Isn’t that great? So let’s look at ours here. We have one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, blocks across. And one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight blocks down. So 56 blocks. And it just makes a great quilt. So I hope this helps you, helps you put a fun twist in some blocks that you’re making. Try it on some blocks beside the nine patch. And we hope you enjoyed this tutorial on the NIne Patch on Point quilt from the MSQC.