Piece & Joy Quilt Along: Week 3
Things are starting to come together this week in the Piece & Joy Quilt Along! With the full and half blocks sewn, we are ready to piece the quilt top together. We will start by piecing the tree point units.
There are eight of these blocks in the quilt, and they are pretty fun to make. You do need to be careful when sewing the large background triangle to the pieced blocks, though, because there isn’t a lot of wiggle room. We highly suggest pinning these blocks together before sewing! Here’s a video showing how to put the large triangle on and trim the block:
Once all the tree point blocks are finished, you can finish putting the rest of the quilt together by row. (If you’re using the book, you will also need to piece and cut the top background strip to size.) Piece all of the full blocks in the middle of the tree together before adding the rest of the pieces in each row.
Make sure to put the correct size of background piece in the correct row. Some of the measurements are similar, but you will be able to tell later on if you mixed them up. You may want to pin the rows together as you sew them to keep everything lined up. You will have some seams to nest within the tree, which definitely helps. Keep going; you’re so close!
For the bulky seams between the hourglass blocks, we found our quilters clapper to be most useful. We got ours from Modern American Vintage. We pressed the seam, placed the clapper, and let it cool down with the clapper weighing the fabric down.
Another little tip for when you are piecing the quilt top is to backstitch on seams that will be on the quilt perimeter. It’s not completely necessary, but it does keep any seams from popping open before you get to the quilting step.
And just like that, the quilt top is done. This beauty is all ready for next week’s quilting! You can share your progress and enter our grand prize drawing in a couple of different ways:
- On Instagram, use both both #pieceandjoyqal and #theclothparcel hashtags in your post. You can also tag us @theclothparcel. (Please note that if you have a private Instagram account, we won’t be able to see any of your posts. You are welcome to screenshot and DM us for your entry to count.)
- In our private Facebook group, you can share photos in a post or in the comments of any of our posts. You can also ask for help or advice from fellow quilters there!
We would love to see your progress, and every photo you share on Instagram or in our Facebook group will earn you an entry into our grand prize drawing at the end of the quilt along!
Prizes will be a queen size batting from Hobbs Batting, along with patterns, stickers, and pins from us. We hope you’ll participate in the fun! As a note, you do not have to completely finish the quilt to be entered in the drawing.
Next week, we will finish up this cute quilt. Let us know if you have any questions about piecing or anything else about the quilt along in the comments!
