Green:  1¼ yards

White:  ½ yard or 7
8″ squares or 26 4″ squares

White for binding:  ½ yard

Ribbon for ties:  3
yards 1/4″ ribbon

Backing:  1¼ yards

Batting:  45″ x
45″
24″ ribbon or string

Cutting Info:

Cut your white fabric to make 26 4″ squares.  If you are using one fabric, 3 4″ strips, subcut to 4″ squares will do it.  I substituted 4 black/white print squares for 4 of the plain white ones just for some variety.

From the green, cut:

3 4″ strips – subcut these to 26 4″ squares

2 3½” strips – subcut to 16 3½” squares

1 12½” strip – subcut to 1 12½” square, 4 3½” x 12½” strips and 4 2½” x 12½” strips

1 6½” strip – subcut to 4 6½” squares and 4 3½” x 6½” strips

1 3½” strip – subcut to 4 3½” x 9½” strips

Half Square Triangles (HSTs):

Draw a diagonal line on the back of each of the white squares.

Place each square right sides together with a green square with the white square on top.

Sew ¼” away from the drawn line on each side of the
line.  I chain stitch about ten squares
at a time sewing one side first.  Then I flip
the whole chain around and sew the other side.

Press.  Cut along the
line.  (I use scissors since an exact
¼” seam allowance is not important at this point).

Press seam open.

Blocks:

Lay out your HSTs and 4 of the 3½”  green squares (corners) according to the photo.  Sew the squares together into rows and then the rows into blocks.

Make 4.

Compass Point blocks:

These are a little tricky since you have to make two pairs that are opposites.  Pay close attention to the pictures and the orientation of your pieces.

Sew a 3½” x 6½” strip to one of the white edges of your HST.  Two of these are sewn to one white edge and two are sewn to the other white edge.  Just keep turning your pieces until they look like the picture.

Next, sew a 3½” x 9½” strip to the long side of the previous piece where the green triangle is. (Click on the diagram to read the words if this isn’t clear).

Now, aligning the top raw edges (as in the lower two blocks), sew a 6½” square onto the other white side of the HST.

Sew the 3½” x 12½” strip along the top edge of all three pieces.  You should end up with four compass point blocks like this:

Block layout:
Lay your blocks out as follows:
Compass Point block, Star block, Compass Point block;
Star block, 12½” square of green, Star block;
Compass Point block, star block, Compass Point block.

Sew these blocks together into rows.  Now, before you sew your rows together, add the 2½” x 12½” strips to the outer edges of the stars.  (I added mine after I sewed the rows together when it became obvious that I needed more background there).

Sew the three rows together.

Your top is done!  Before we make the sandwich and quilt, we need to mark the final cutting lines for the tree skirt.  As with most quilt marking, it is easier to do this before you have the bulk of the batting and backing added.  So, press your top and spread it out on a hard surface.

Measure 6″ from the top and left sides of the center 12″ block and mark this point (the center of the block).

Tie some ribbon or string (not the three yards) around a marking pencil.  Measure 18″ from the pencil and place a pin in the ribbon/string at this point.

Place the pin at the center point you marked earlier and, keeping the ribbon/string tight, draw an 18″ diameter circle to mark the outer edge of the tree skirt.  Do your best to keep the pin and pencil in the same position while you are drawing.  Repeat this process with the pin 2½” from the pencil to mark the inner circle.  Next, line up your ruler with one end at the center mark and the long edge running between a star block and a compass point and draw a line.  This will be where you cut to fit your skirt around the tree.  See the finished picture above if this is confusing.  I tried to take pictures of these marks but they would not show up at all.

Don’t cut on these lines yet!!  Sandwich your backing, batting and top and quilt the tree skirt.  I quilted mine along the diagonal lines made by the triangles in the star blocks and compass points.  When you are finished quilting, cut along the outer circle, along the inner circle and the line connecting them.

Ties:

Fold the 3 yards of ribbon in half 4 times and cut at the loops to make 8 roughly equal pieces of ribbon.

On the back of the tree skirt, place a piece of ribbon 1″ from the inner and outer edges of the skirt on each side of the opening.  Place the other four pieces about 5″ apart.  Baste in place.

Binding:
We definitely need bias binding here with all these curves!  Cut 7 2½” wide bias binding strips from your binding fabric.  Join them together and apply them to your skirt as you would to any quilt.

All these steps make this look kind of hard, but it really isn’t.  Basically you make a strangely shaped quilt top, quilt it, cut openings and bind it. You can do that!  Don’t forget to add your projects to the Flickr group to win prizes!  Come back next week for pillows 🙂