Hello, today I'd like to show you again using some 5 inch squares. I do like those 5 inch squares. A block that I have made up using the 5 inch squares is a starting point and this is a traditional block it's called Picket Fence and as you can see it's made up of strips that are joined diagonally, three strips and the opposite two corners have another stronger colour or a dark colour or a different colour to the rest of the block and when you put several of these together or four of them together and you turn them around and I'll show you shortly about that, they actually form a nice star in the middle but initially I'll just show you how to make the block. So starting off with some 5 inch squares and I've just got half a dozen squares lined up here and I'm going to just trim off one side of those to make it actually 5 inch by 4 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 so I just down one side and using my ruler my board as a guide with my ruler I'm just going to trim off half an inch there and now I'm going to turn that around and again line it up with my board so it's nice and straight and I'm going to cut those in half so I'm going to cut up two and a half inches so I'll end up with rectangles that are two and a half inches by four and a half inches and then in order to make this block where we've got the two stronger colours I've got two fabrics here that are stronger and four fabrics here and I need four for the rest of the block. So we're going to be joining this to this and this to this and this to this but we need to join them on a diagonal so it would be much easier if fabrics came with a diagonal mark just where you need one but that doesn't usually happen so we're going to mark our own. So on the lighter ones because it's easier to see on the light colour I'm just going to show you how you can mark a diagonal because what we're going to be doing is sewing if you lay your dark piece down and lay your lighter piece at right angles to it so that the corner matches up there we're going to sew from this point down to this point but it's been hard to know exactly where that point is when you're trying to sew it because you can't actually see that fabric underneath. So in order to mark that diagonal line on that lighter piece of fabric if you grab a ruler pretty much any ruler has a marking that does the 45 degree angle this one's got one but I actually just going to use the square because it's just easier just at the moment. So this line coming through here is at 45 degrees I know it's maths we don't like maths but we're having a little bit of maths today. So I'm going to line this 45 degree line up with the edge of my fabric so that then when that sits so I've lined that up along there and I've got the point at the point of the fabric as well and then I can draw the line from there down and I think you'll find that that now is the right position when we lay that one back on a piece of fabric where we want to sew it together that that starts there and it finishes up right where that point is down there so we need to sew that line there. So we need to do three pairs of these and I've actually got three pairs already to sewed so we've got the dark one underneath both times and the other one is just two lights together. So this can be all different fabrics but it's quite good if your two opposite corners are a contrast to the rest of them. You can make this quilt completely scrappy I've just chosen to use pretty much two colors, different fabrics but two colors. So now at the sewing machine I'm going to sew that diagonal line right on the line that you've drawn. So we need to do three of these for each block. And you can just get them ready like I have in chain piece them through. And you just snip them apart. Now we need to trim those corners off. Now if you were really keen on preserving your fabric you could do a second line of sewing half an inch away and then you'd have a little tiny half inch squares but I'm not doing that today. I have done it and done it for borders and things. So I'm now going to trim away quarter of an inch away into that triangle from the seam that we've just sewn. So I'll do all three and then I'm going to press them. That's always a good idea to press towards the darker fabric so that it seems don't show through the lighter fabrics. So just lay down your lighter fabric holding up your dark one. And just press it over that seam. Sit down, sitting quite nicely. Just get all three of those done. And with the two lights it doesn't really matter which one you press which way of course. And so now I've got my three pieces and I want to join them together to form a block like this. So I need to have my darks at opposite ends and I need to be joining that longer side of the dark against the middle light strip and again the longer side there but coming from the other direction. So that all these are going that way the darks are opposite but it's this longer side that needs to be against that. So you don't want to be joining it like that for example. So we'll come back here so that doesn't get fixed in your mind. And now we just need to do those two seams. Make sure that you're keeping everything in the right position. And we'll give that a quick price. Again holding your fabrics up let that seam just go to one side for both of those seams. And there you've got your block. Now your block should be measuring six and a half inches which it is in both directions. So it's a six and a half inch unfinished block so finished when it's sewn in with the same allowance as gone it will be a six inch block. But really it's helpful to do them in lots of four. So you could really say this is quarter of a block because you need four of them to form the actual style that we're going to form. So if I and you just alternating them so you're turning one one way and one the other way. And if you keep coming round with the four blocks you'll end up with a star in the middle. And so then every time you join another lot you're going to as you can see here if I start turning these ones around you're going to end up with another star forming at each intersection. So that your corners would just have that at the corner of your quilt for instance and you could choose not to have that corner you could just make that two lights specifically in the corner. But if you're going to keep on going and make a bit bigger quilt you'll find that these stars keep forming at those intersections of the four. So that's a really fun block. So when it's if you join the four up to make a block it will eventually be a 12 inch it'll measure 12 and a half inch but it'll be a 12 inch block in that state. So that might help you. So I have done a pattern using the five inch squares in my downloadable patterns that you can purchase at gourmetcourtier.com and I've called it Pick It Fence and this just shows you a picture on the pattern here of what the quilt might look like just using what actually random colors but I've used different lights for the background and some multicolors for the star points. So as long as they contrast with your other fabric that looks really good. Thank you.