Second Part of Delectable Mountains

STEP SIX: Stack the separated blocks on top of each other at your pressing table.  I like to take two together and spritz the seam with a mist before pressing the seam flat.  Then open the block and press the seam toward the dark fabric.  I like to do this on the right side, sliding the side of the iron over the seam from light to dark.

STEP SEVEN:  Take the pressed blocks back to your cutting board and square them up to an exact 8" square.  An 8" Bias Square Ruler is a great help for this step.  I like to put my Quilter's Cut 'n Press on top of my 24" x 36" cutting board.  Using this I can trim the right hand side and the top side of the block, turn the Cut 'n Press 180º and trim the other two sides.

STEP EIGHT:  Take the two matching blocks and lay them directly on top of each other, right sides facing, and LIGHT ON TOP OF DARK.  I like to always put the dark half of the top square on the bottom right.  Starting from the left edge, cut the two blocks into 2" strips.  There will be four sets of 2" strips for each block.

STEP NINE: Pick up each set of strips and separate them, laying the bottom strip right side up in a top row and the top strip right side up in a bottom row.  You will have four strips on top and four strips on bottom.  Now take strip #2 and put it face down on strip #1; take strip #4 and put it face down on strip #3.  Do the same to the bottom row.  In this photo strip #4 is lifted away from strip #3 on the top row to illustrate that they are right sides together.  Pick up strips 1/2 and place them on top of 3/4, then place that pile on top of 1/2 of the bottom row, and place all on top of 3/4 of the bottom row.  You now have two blocks cut into strips and set into sewing order.

Here are eleven sets of strips lined up ready to be sewed into blocks.  Next time I will show the sewing and pressing order for these sets.

NOTE: The rest of this tutorial was finally published on August 18.  Sorry about that delay!