Fourth Clue

Gather 32 (72, 84) Fabric A 3" squares and 32 (72, 84) Fabric E 3" squares together.

Following the instructions below - you will now make Half-Square Triangles with these squares:

• Use a ruler and draw a line on the wrong side of the light fabric from one corner to the opposite corner.   See figure 3.
• Place light and dark squares right sides together, light fabric up so the line can be seen.
• Sew 1/4" to the left of centerline.
• Do not remove and cut threads; feed another pair of squares under your presser foot, lifting a little as needed, and sew as you did the first pair; continue in this way until all 32 (72, 84) pairs have been sewn.
• Take the last pair (you may cut the thread if you wish but you don't need to), turn it around and sew another seam along the 'new' left side of the centerline.  The pile of 'attached' squares may be kept to the left of your machine or in your lap.  I sometimes do a little of both for ease of feeding with this method.
• Continue sewing each pair until you have finished all 32 (72, 84) pairs.  Remove from machine, snip threads.  Now snip the threads joining all the squares to each other.
• Now cut along the centerlines of all squares - you can use a rotary cutter and ruler or sit in your comfy chair with a pair of scissors and relax.
• Press open towards the dark half.  Fig 4
• Trim and square to 2 1/2"

You should now have a total of 64 (144, 168) half-square triangles.  

Figure 5

File these as Fourth Clue.

Back to Intro