Happy Telecast Thursday!

I'm enjoying my looong summer vacation since I'm done work until the end of August. Yeah! There is definitely an advantage for a quilter to be free for a few months before returning to work/school in the fall. It's a great time to catch up on projects!

Teaser: I am gearing up for not just one, but two online quilt alongs! One is starting very soon (the Potion Quilt Along) and the other one will be running in September. Keep watching your inbox for more details soon.

Okay, now back to Telecast Thursday. This week I have another stitch and flip block to share with you. I love all the different combinations and hope that you are enjoying them too.

They say that "diamonds are a girl's best friend" and sticking with that theme, I'm showing you how to create a Gemstone block. Create this in your favourite gem colour (mine would be green for emeralds) and you can have a whole quilt full of sparklies.

Now to get down to the construction method. To create one block you'll need:

1 background rectangle
4 corner squares

Did you notice the difference from the other stitch and flip blocks? Yes, we are using a rectangle, not a square, for the background. So daring!

In my example, my background rectangle is 3 1/2 x 6 1/2" and my corner squares are 2" square. Choose contrasting fabric for the corner squares to get that gemstone effect.

Like the previous stitch and flip blocks, you will be drawing a diagonal line on the back of all the 2" corner squares. Be sure to use a removable marker so you won't have these lines hanging around after you've created the block.

Arrange the corner squares on the corners of the background rectangle and stitch on the diagonal lines. Click on the image below to watch exactly how to arrange these to be sure your Gemstone block turns out okay.

After you've finished stitching, you will need to trim off the excess fabric on all corners and press the corner squares out to the corners of the rectangle - or where they were before you trimmed them off :)

For more information, click on the image below to watch the video.

I really like the look of this Gemstone block and can see using it in lots of projects. Let me know in the Comments below or on my YouTube channel how you would use these blocks in a quilt project: make a lot and combine them, combine them with other stitch and flip blocks?

Creatively,

P.S. Join me in my private Chatterbox Quilts Facebook group to chat about vintage sewing machines and quilting topics. I'd love to see you there :)