Hi everybody, it’s Jenny from the MSQC. And I’ve got a great project for you today.. Take a look at this quilt behind me. Isn’t this fun? We’re calling this Two Way Street because to me it kind of looks like mini traffic jams. It’s got a lot of modern qualities to it which I really like. It’s a fun and easy block. And let me show you how to do that. So to make this quilt what you’re going to need is two packs of five inch squares. And we’ve used Authentic Etc. by Sweetwater for Moda. And it’s just a darling print. You’re going to need some background fabric. And we’re using 4 ¼ yards of background fabric. And that takes care of all this plus your first border and your setting triangles here on every other row. And we went with the background because we just wanted to introduce a new color. So you play with your fabric and use whatever color you choose but you’re going to need 4 ¼ yards. Alright now for your border out here, this is a big 6 ½ inch border. It’s a nice big border and we used a yard and a half for that. The backing is 5 ¼ yards and it makes a great size quilt. It’s 74 by 86. So let me show you how to do this.

So the first thing we’re going to do is we’re going to take our little five inch squares. Ad we’re going to take all of them and cut them in half just like this. So you can lay it on the 2 ½ inch line and just cut them straight in half like this. Now for 54 of those you’re going to cut in half again. Alright? So we are going to have some 2 ½ inch squares and some 2 ½ by five inch rectangles to make this block. You’re going to need four of these for each block. And you’re going to need four of these for each block as well. Then we have to cut our background. There’s two ways to do this. We need some 1 ½ inch strips and some 2 ½ inch strips. When I cut strip sets I like to fold my fabric in half so that I have less area to mess up. You just have to make sure that your fold lines up exactly. I line mine up on the dots of the selvedge. And make sure it’s lined up nice and straight. And you can do this two ways. You can cut a 1 ½ inch strip and cut your pieces out of that. Or you can take the width of the piece that you need. So five, one of our strips is cut at five inches. One of them is cut 5 ½ . And you can cut a strip set. So I’ll cut a five inch strip set right here and show you what I’m talking about. So you can do this. And then you can take this. It’s already now cut at five. And we will then cut these into 2 ½ by five inch. I mean 2 ½ inch pieces. So we’ll just do this. And that will give us our five, our 2 ½ by five inch rectangles that we need to match with those. And then for our little ones we’ll cut 1 ½. Now you’re going to need some 1 ½ by fives and some 1 ½ by 5 ½. And I’ll show you how to put that together. It will all make sense to you. Don’t worry.

So now we’ve got all of our pieces cut and we’re ready to make our block. You notice I have some of mine labeled. That’s because I just get mixed up and I’m a messy creator. And it keeps them together for me. So what I’m going to do is, this is the little block we’re going for. And we’re going to take one of our pieces right here. Our little rectangles, 2 ⅕ by five inch rectangles. And we’re going to take a 2 ½ by five inch background piece over here. Put them together. And we’re going to take a 2 ½ inch square and snowball the top of this. Now I’m going to finger press a line. You can draw the line or press the line. And we have to lay it so that this point goes in. It goes in toward the fabric. And you want to make sure that it’s sewn on that side of your strip. And so we’re going to go ahead and take this to the sewing machine and sew right on the line. Alright here we go. So we’re just going to sew right across right on the line and then I like to fold it back and make sure that I did a good job and my corner is covered. And it is. So then we can trim that little piece off right there. And I’m just laying my ruler a quarter of an inch from my seam line. And cutting off that little piece. And I’m going to go and press it back. Alright.

Ok so now what we’re going to do is we’re going to take our 1 ½ inch pieces and we know these are five inches tall. So we’re going to take a 1 ½ by five inch strip and we’re going to sew it right in the middle like that. And, and go ahead and sew a quarter of an inch down the side, putting this strip right down the middle. So just line it up on your edges and sew a quarter of an inch. There we go and one more. I’m just going to open this up and just kind of finger press it back. And then I’m going to add my other piece to it. Fold it toward it. And I always like to start, if I have a strip that I’m adding, if there’s a seam in it I always like to start at the other end. I don’t know why. It’s like less bulk or something like that. Alright. So then we can press this open now. And I’m going to press this so this little seam goes to the middle. And lays down real nice. See how nice that is laid down right there. I’ll put it right there so you can see it.

Alright now the last thing we need to do for our block to complete it is take our 1 ½ by 5 ½ inch strip and we’re going to put it right across the top. So this is our little topper strip right here. And we’re just going to sew that on, right on the top. And then again that was a quarter of an inch. Alright so I’ve got those seams all nice and flat. Now this block in order for it to work because we are going to rotate it around. It’s got to be square. So make sure you square up your blocks. For mine, our block is 5 ½ one direction and we need it 5 ½ the other direction. So I’m going to lay that on my mat and trim off a half an inch. And then this squares it up so they can then work together as a block. Whenever you add a strip you have to do a little bit of fiddling to make sure that they’re all the same size.

Alright so then what we’re going to do is we’re going to turn this like this. Each block is going to be turned. Here’s one more and so here’s how it is straight, then we’re going to turn it. See how it comes together and it makes this cute little pinwheel thing. I have this row that’s already sewn together so let me use that one. Here’s our top right here. And then this one is going to come this way. Wait for it, there, wait. There we go. I get so turned around. Alright here we go. Alright so we’re watching these right here. We want them in, over, up, and over. That’s what we’re watching for. And we’re also watching for these little ones to all be pointing inward. And then our top strip comes as a criss cross. It kind of makes a little secret Illinois road. Because it’s background fabric it doesn’t show up too much. So then what we’re going to do is we’re going to sew these two together and sew them onto this other strip that I’ve already gotten prepared. So we’re going to go ahead and sew this quarter of an inch right down. And then we’re going to add this to the other side. And I’m just going to lay my piece right along the edge, take a few stitches, make sure my, my, I have a center seam in here. Even though I have that little, the little sashing strip, I still have a center seam. And we’re going to go ahead and put that on there. And this is our little block right here. Alrighty. How fun is this? Isn’t that fun?

Alright so now I want you to come with me to the quilt and take a look at how we put this together. So we wanted to stagger these so it just gave it a little more movement. So on the first block here we put a sashing strip in between every block. And we have one, two, three, four, five blocks. On the next row we have one, two, three, four blocks but we have a little setting, a wide sashing strip on the sides here. Right here on both ends and that off sets itself. So it give it some movement. So three rows are done whole and three rows are done with that sashing strip. So here’s our little sashing strips. I’ll show you what I’m talking about right here at the table. And we’re just going to sew our blocks together. Block, strip, block, strip. Just like this. And you’re going to make sure that your block, your strips are the same length as your block. You can see mine is a little short. I pre cut them. And I would wait to do that until your block is finished so you make sure that it just matches up just perfectly. And we’re going to do our whole row like that, so strip, block, strip, block, strip, block just like that. Alright?

Then the next row we are going to start it with these rectangles right here. And these are, I think they’re six. Let me see. Let me check here. 6 ½ by ten. So a 6 ½ by ten inch rectangle and we’re going to start our row with one of those. And what that does is it offsets our block So now we have this cool movement going on. And then you’re just going to continue and sash, a little sashing strip and a block and a sashing strip and a block. And ending that row with the same big block. So you’re going to do that for every other row. And it just makes this quilt come together so nice and so quick. It gives it some movement. It gives it a, just a little bit different look. And it’s just fun to try something new, isn’t it? So we hope you enjoyed this tutorial on the Two Way Street quilt from the MSQC.