Cutting Your Triangles - Nativity in the Trees Quilt-Along - Lesson 3

I had hoped to get this Lesson up by Saturday, but I had several deadlines converge and got a little behind.  Fortunately, this is the biggest lesson, so from here on out, they should come faster.

Are you ready to cut your triangles?  If you're just now joining us, be sure to check out our other lessons here:

Lesson 1 - Fabric Selection	Lesson 2 - Sewing Your Greens	Lesson 3 - Cutting Your Triangles
Lesson 4 - Basic Applique	Lesson 5 - Sewing Your Triangles	Lesson 6 - Advanced Machine Applique

Before we'll be ready to cut out our triangles, we're going to need to add some angle markings to your ruler.  I decided to make the angle at the tip of the triangle thinking we could use the angles already marked on our ruler...but it turns out we need to measure the angles at the bottom of our triangle.  None of the typical angle markings would give the look I wanted, so I just added my own.  And the good news for you, is that the lines are really easy to add using this template.



Just place the template under your quilting ruler.  Place a piece of paper or cardstock on top of your ruler directly above the line on the template.  Use an ultra-fine-tip Sharpie or similar pen to mark your lines.

At this point, you should have your wide green strips sewn together and trimmed to 10 1/2 inches wide.  If you haven't squared the ends already, we're going to do that first.  Use whichever lines are convenient on your ruler to square off the end and trim.

Now we're ready to start using those angle markings we added.  If you participated in the Hexies by Halves Quilt-Along, the process is very similar to how we cut out the half-hexies...except even easier.  You're going to line up one of your angle markings with the bottom of your green strip so that the edge of the ruler is about 1/2 inch in from the edge you just squared.  Note: My angle lines on my ruler didn't show up well in the photographs, so I've placed a green line over them using Photoshop so they'll show up better.)

After you make the cut, you'll rotate the ruler to that it's tipped the other direction.  The edge of the ruler should be right next to your previous cut, so that it forms a point at the upper edge of your fabric.  You'll also need your angle marking lined up with the edge of your fabric.

After your second cut, rotate your ruler again for the third cut and continue on.  You should be able to get 7  whole triangles, and 2 half-triangles (which are also triangles I know...but they're half the size) from each strip of fabric.

In the end, you will need a total of 27 full triangles and 6 half triangles cut out of your green.  (Four sets of green should give you 28 full triangles and 8 half triangles.)

You'll find that even triangles that come from the same set of green will look different when they're all turned the same direction.  (Sorry about the creepy shadows in the pictures...just the reality of taking pictures in the evening...not a lot of daylight these days.)

Now we're going to cut out our background triangles.  You'll start as we did when we were cutting out our green strips...Fold your fabric in half down the center, with the selvage edges matching up.  Then square and trim the raw edge of your fabric, lining one of the ruler lines up with the center fold.

Now, because the strip we're going to cut is 10 1/2 inches wide...which is probably wider than your ruler, we're going to use the lines on the mat.  Line the trimmed edge of your fabric up with one of the lines on your cutting mat.

Then count up 10 inches from where your fabric is lined up and put the 1/2 inch mark on your ruler there.  (For instance, I lined up my fabric along the 1-inch line...so I used the 11-inch line because it was 10 inches away.)  And of course double check you've really got 10 1/2 inches before you cut.

You'll need a total of 4 of these 10 1/2 inch wide strips if you're making a quilt.  If you're making a table runner, you'll just need 1 strip (or actually more like half of the strip...but it still needs to be 10 1/2 inches side.

If you're making a table runner, you'll need to cut one two-inch strip that is the width of your fabric (or as long as you plan to make your table runner.)

Now we're going to cut our strips into triangles.  This is really exactly the same as what we did for the greens.  You can even stack your four strips on top of each other and get them all done at once if you'd like.

You'll start by squaring your end and trimming off your selvage edge.

now you're going to line up one of your angle markings with the bottom of your background strip so that the edge of the ruler is about 1/2 inch in from the edge you just squared.

After you make the first cut, you'll rotate the ruler to that it's tipped the other direction.  The edge of the ruler should be right next to your previous cut, so that it forms a point at the upper edge of your fabric.  You'll also need your angle marking lined up with the edge of your fabric.

Just as with the green fabric, you should be able to get 28 large triangles and 8 half-triangles from your fabric.  You will need 27 triangles and 6 half triangles to complete the quilt.

And that's where we'll leave things for now!  Our next lesson will deal with adding the trunk appliques to your pieces, and then you'll be ready to sew them together.

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