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Modern Trees
Welcome to my Modern Trees Quilt Along, the 7th in a series of quilt alongs right here on my blog. I will walk you through the entire process of making a quilt from start to finish, including quilting and binding. So please, work at your own pace, take pride in your work and unleash your creativity during this quilt along to truly make it your own.
Modern Tree Blocks, Finished Size 6″ x 8″
I’m really pleased with how my trees are turning out. (Kona cotton solids are my favorite if you haven’t figured that out already, LOL!)
Here are a couple of “housekeeping” items before we begin:
- There’s no sign up necessary to follow my quilt alongs. Simply click the project you want to make and follow the tutorials at your own pace.
- You are welcome to share any of the pictures of my quilt alongs on your own blogs or flickr groups. However, please be sure to link back here. If you want to make a quilt and sell it, or enter it into a quilt show, etc. that’s fine. Just be sure to credit me as the design source.
- This quilt is not large and is the perfect size to machine quilt on a home machine so I encourage you to give it a try. I will be demonstrating how to make the quilt layout above, but you are welcome to add more trees or borders to make it bigger. See my previous post for more layout options.
It took me a total of 2 hours to complete today’s lesson.
Step 1 – Cutting the Trees (30 Minutes)
If using strips, first cut a 6.5″ strip from your tree fabric. (Note that a 6.5″ square will not be wide enough. If you are using scrappy squares, they must be at least 6.5″ x 7″ each).
Cut 6.5″ Strips
From the tri recs ruler set, use the “tri” tool as a template cut out a total of 15 (or more) tree shapes. Notice that the top of the triangle has a blunt end. Line this up with the top of your strip.
Line up Tri tool with top and bottom edge.
Turn the tri tool upside down to cut the next tree. Alternate directions with the tri shape until you have cut enough trees. If you are using directional fabrics, you may want to position them so that the design is facing “up” each time.
Alternate the ruler to cut more trees.
For cutting efficiency, you can stack up to 4 layers at a time. Continue cutting until you have cut all of the trees and step back to admire your pretty colors!
Cut 15 or more tree tops.
Step 2 – Cutting the Tree Backgrounds (15 minutes)
Cut 2 (6.5″) strips of cream background fabric. Leave them folded in half so you will get left and right facing half-rectangles. You need one pair per tree.
Recs Tool
Using the recs tool, line up the top and bottom with the edges of your strip and trim on all sides. Notice that there is an extra blunted part on the top of the recs. Be sure to trim that off, too. It will ensure accuracy when sewing the pieces together.
Half Rectangles
Continue cutting until you have one pair of half rectangles for every tree. In my case, I need 15 pairs, or a total of 30 half rectangles. Half will face left, and half will face right.
Step 3 – Sewing the Tree Tops (30 Minutes)
Lay out your tree tops with their matching background pieces. Be very careful to position them so that when sewn, they form a square. It may take a minute, but refer back to this picture so your orientation is correct.
Treetop Layout
Match up the ends so they look like the pictures below. The pictures show the left rectangle placed on top of the tree, flipped around so it is ready to sew. Click the images to get a larger view.
Front
Back
Sew all of the left triangles so that they look like this when finished:
Left Triangles Sewn
Trim off the little dog-eared triangle tips as you go. Sew all of the right hand triangles in the same way. This is how the ends should match up:
Sew the right side triangles.
Press the left seams one way and the right seams the other way, forming an “x” with your seam allowances at the apex (top) of the triangle.
The top seam allowances form an x.
Step 4 – Sewing and Cutting the Trunks (15 Minutes)
WOF = Width of Fabric
The trunks can easily be strip pieced. Cut out 1 (1.5″ x WOF) strip of brown and 2 (3″ x WOF) strips of background. Sew these together to create a strip band that looks like this:
Tree Trunk Bands
Cut them into 2 1/2″ rectangles for a total of 15 pieces, or one for every tree. Make more bands if you are making more blocks.
Tree Trunks
Step 5 – Join The Trees and Press (30 Minutes)
Now join your tree tops and your tree trunks together to make a modern tree block. Stack them so you can assembly line (chain sew) as you go. Press the seams away from the tree fabric so that you have x’s on the back where the seams intersect. This will help align your seam allowances when the blocks are sewn together next time.
The blocks will finish 6″ x 8″ (6.5″ x 8.5″ unfinished).
Improv Trees – Try a Few!
I sewed together a few improv tree tops and they were actually quite fun. I took the leftover scraps from my trees and sewed them together randomly into larger and larger chunks of fabric.
Sewing Improv Scraps
Then I treated them like regular fabric yardage. I cut the sewn chunks into 6.5″ wide strips and cut triangle shapes from them.
The cutting is the same.
Now I have a bunch of improv tree tops! I have to admit, they are kind of growing on me. I’m already coming up with ideas on how to use them….
Improv Tree Tops
Quilt Along Schedule: All links will be active when the post is published.
- Modern Trees Intro and Supply List
- Step 1 – Cutting and Sewing the Tree Blocks
- Step 2 – Assembling the Quilt Top
- Step 3 – Backing and Basting
- Step 4 – Machine Quilting Part 1
- Step 5 – Machine Quilting Part 2
- Step 6 – Binding to Finish
If you are quilting along with me, please be sure to share pictures of your progress on my Christa’s Quilt Along flickr group.
Sharing is Caring
Please share your work in progress in my facebook group: Quilt With Christa . 
Grab my Quilt Along button and share the love!
<div align="center"><a href="http://christasquiltalong.com" title="Christa's Quilt Along" target="_blank"><img src="https://christaquilts.files.wordpress.com/2013/03/christas-quilt-along-175-2.png" alt="Christa's Quilt Along" style="border:none;" /></a></div>
This tutorial is a very very must do 😀!
Great tutorial. One of the best! Really appreciate the hours-spent estimate. I may have to increase it for me because I go so slow and new to FMQ. Can’t wait to see more from you!!!
Thanks so much for your sweet comments!
I just updated my blog with my 5 improv trees! I’ll be making a table runner.
Lovely tutorial, thank you.
Really love how your improv trees turned out. Just got my trees sewn together. Didn’t take too much time and the instructions were really clear! Can’t wait for the next step!
http://www.inspiringcreationsblog.com/2013/09/modern-trees-quilt-along-part-ii.html
Loving your improv trees! I found your blog through tweloquilting’s blog and browsed through some of your older projects. Not sure I can fit in another “along” of any kind, but your trees do tempt me…
Love the improv tree blocks they are great!!
your instructions are always so detailed Christa! and this quilt is going to be so cute!
Thank you so much for linking up with Needle and Thread Thursday!
Kelly @ My Quilt Infatuation
decided on 2 extra rows and a mixture of solid and scrappy blocks!! love it!!
I love this quilt along! I had bought some Christmas fabrics in 6 1/2-inch widths for an Advent calendar, and was wondering what to do with the leftovers. It also turns out I had bought these rulers for another pattern, so I am totally set! Got my trees cut out today, and now all I need is some background and backing fabric. It was serendipity.
I added your button to my blog, and I look forward to making one of these for myself and a couple for gifts.
I make a lot of Christmas tree skirts for wedding shower presents. This design has my brain spinning…how could I set these blocks in a circular pattern to make a skirt?…. I’ll have to play with that idea. Love the block!
I like these. They’d look great in the right Christmas fabric too!
I really want to have a go at this!
Can’t wait to get started! I just posted about it on my blog. Hopefully I’ll have time tonight to start cutting into my fabric!
Christa –
Thanks for the fun QAL! I’m wondering if I should cut into my precious hoard of Hoffman Christmas Metallics for this one.😛
Lisa
This looks like a great project!
Your version is going to be a “knock out” once it it’s stitched/quilted!!!!! Love it already!!! Hugs…
Did you know there are only 90 days left until Christmas? Thank you for hosting such a fun project to help us get a jump on things, Christa! Your trees are looking fabulous! I especially like the solids!
thanks for the tutorial, and thanks for the time recommendations. what size is the finished block?
They will finish 6″ x 8″. Thanks for asking – I’ll update the post with that info.
I like this ruler set! I wish you had a Print Friendly button!
You are in luck – my technical genius of a husband just added one!
I love the way you divided it into time segments. This will really help me to organize my time and get this part done before October 9! Thank you.
Cool! I like your improv version.