Hello, everyone!

I've been sewing for 30+ years, even been employed as a seamstress, and quilting here and there for about the last 10 years.

However, in the midst of cutting material for a new quilt project, I didn't pay enough attention to the directions and I made a big mistake - with a LOT of material. Please help me rescue this project intended for my teenage daughter's first quilt from Mom!

The directions said to cut a 5-3/8" square, then cut in half diagonally, making two triangles. Well, stupid me, I cut a 5" square, then cut that in half, not realizing what I had done until it was too late.

The finished size of each block is apparently supposed to be 4-1/2 x 4-1/2. This, in itself, seems confusing. How could you cut a block 5-3/8" x 5-3/8" and make it equal 4-1/2" if the seam allowance is 1/4"? Am I missing something, here, when considering the focal, whole block is supposed to be cut to 5" x 5"?

Is there any way to save this material for this quilt, without these blocks obviously looking like mistakes? Is there is a way to make them just look "creative?"

Your expertise and experience would be greatly appreciated in southern California!

I think you could make the rest of the block pieces smaller to match that size. I am not sure I have what you are doing perfectly straight in my mind. You might have to make more smaller blocks to get a good size quilt. Does that make sense? Probably not. WHen I do half sq triangles I alays make them larger then take the time to square them up to size.

When you start with 2 5 3/8" blocks, draw a line diagonally and then sew 1/4" on either side of this line you get 2 blocks that should be 4 1/2". What you did wrong was you cut before you sewed. What pattern are you using? Is it possible to make your blocks a bit smaller and then perhaps add a border if needed?

That may work. I can check out the 5 x 5 focal squares to see if I can cut them down, along with the triple rails, which are cut to 2 x 2...My math skills are going to be stretched to the limit here, I think...Ha! ha!

Do you get the feeling there may be something not quite right with the instructions, that it calls for the 5-3/8" triangles which are supposed to match with the focal squares being cut to 5 x 5"? Is it just me, or does this just seem WRONG?

Could you scan the directions in so we could read them? And show the block?

Something does sound wonky there. I would need to see it though. I am a visual person.

You are probably going to use the 5 3/8" squares to make half square triangles.

If you want to sew two triangles together to make a square, you start by cutting squares cut that are 7/8" bigger than the finished size of square you want to end up with. Cut it on the diagonal, sew them together and you will get a 4 1/2" square.

4 1/2 + 7/8 = 5 3/8

When you are doing HST's you always add 7/8" to the finished size block. So say you want a 5" finished and you are cutting HST's you would add 7/8" to that and cut your block out 5 7/8". If you're doing QST's you would add 1 1/4" to the finished size and then cut into quarters.

Does this make sense?

A lot of individuals won't mess with the say 5 3/8", they would make it 5 1/2" - 6" and resize it down to the 4 1/2" when squaring up.

What pattern are you using, maybe someone can come up with a solution for you?

Hello and Welcome from Northern Indiana ! Glad you joined us :lol:

Sounds like you are geting the help you need :thumbup:

If you can show a picture of the quilt, I may be able to help you with this using my EQ program :wink: