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Thursday, October 10, 2013

Disappearing 4 Patch tutorial

Earlier this week I showed a D4P block I had whipped up for a mug rug. Missy wrote and asked if I would be willing to share a tutorial. Of course!

The original Pinterest pin I stole it from is here which includes the math for different size blocks.

Sew (4) 5" squares together and spiral the center seam.

Use your favorite pencil to mark 2" to the side of each corner, for a total of 8 marks.


Without moving the fabric, cut 4 diagonal lines from mark to mark made in the previous photo.
You can barely make out the cut lines above - 2 from purple to purple block and 2 from striped to strip.
 

This is the fun step!
Move all the triangles one place to the right and rotate the center square a quarter turn.

Since my cutting mat is not on my sewing machine table,
I place all the bits and parts on a square ruler to move them to the sewing machine.

Essentially we are now working with a 9 patch.
Sew the 9 parts in to 3 rows and then sew the rows together.

Becasue of the angles, you'll need to square up your block.

My blocks have been 7.5" unfinished.

Hopefully that was clearer than mud but let me know if you have questions and I would love to see what blocks you make :)


18 comments:

BillieBee (billiemick) said...

It's a great tute! I'm in love with your fabrics....what are they called?

Turid said...

Thank you so much! I'll test this block next week.

Vireya said...

Thank you for showing how you made this. I was looking at your block on the previous post for a while trying to figure it out. I think I will have to give it a go!

margaret said...

thanks Sarah, looks a bit complicated but will get my brain around it

Manuela said...

Thank you very much for this tutorial.

Greetings, Manuela

Missy Shay said...

Boy do I wish you were right here to walk me through that! LOL I'll have to figure that one out after I move!

Denise :) said...

Oooh! Fun playing with pieces!! Easy and terribly great looking! :)

Silvinha said...


Hello Sara your work is beautiful thanks for sharing

Angie in SoCal said...

Oh, I"m bookmarking this tut! So different from the first disappearing four patch I've seen. Thanks!

eileensideways said...

thanks for sharing your creativity. very pretty block

Unknown said...

Loved the tutorial, tried it tonight and it worked beautifully. Thank you!

Unknown said...

Wouldn't you have to have a 4" ruler in order for this to work properly? My Ruler is 5" wide, so I'm assuming I would mark at the 1" point?

Mavis said...

Sky Feathers: No, any size ruler will work. You mark the edge of the fabric where you want to cut (2 inches from the corners),and line up any straight edge ruler to match the right marks.

Love this block. I will be giving a demo on that at our quilt show.

Unknown said...

I love how you just took a 4 patch and cut it to look totally different. The nine patch is beautiful too. Looks harder then it is. Thanks for sharing

Flower girl said...

This is really clever. So easy but what a great block you have made. I cant wait to see how several would look together.

Rapunzellen's quilt blog said...

Thank you so much for the tutorial. I have been wondering so long about how to make the block and now I found your post on Pinterest 😊.

Shannon Woods said...

I decided to make a quilt using this block. Once the block is completed it looks like a very complicated block... but it does take a long time to complete a block in my opinion...and I also figured out that you must be very precise on your cuts or it will mess up the final block. Not sure why you spiral the center seam. I have more difficulty with the seams where 2 seams come together. All in all... it is a very clever block and I am sure once completed my quilt will be very cool looking.

Patricia Lessell said...

WOWEE thanks so much. I’m so going to copy you. Anyone would think I was a kid and not an old person. 💖