At least I remembered my camera today

I got a bit of sewing done yesterday, then kicked myself because I'd forgotten to bring along my camera.  Not that I could have shared the pictures, mind you, since most of what I worked on was super-secret.  But at least if I'd taken some photos, I could have posted them after the holidays...
So today, since I remembered the camera, and since I got done all the non-Allietare stuff that was on the to-do list (well, on today's list.  I'm not done done, if you know what I mean.  But manageable chunks should be my middle name at this point), I picked back up where I left off on clue 3.

I had cut and sewed and cut and made stacks and stacks of twosies.

And I started pairing them up and I sewed and I sewed and I sewed and I sewed until I had what looked like a gajillion 4-patches.
Yeehaw!  I even  worried a little that I had overshot the target of 120.  Oh, well - there's always a use for 4-patches, right?
So I pressed and I pressed and I pressed and I pressed.  And I counted.
I had 68 of the damn things.
That couldn't be right.  I counted them again.
Yep, 68.
Crap.
So this time I tried a different approach.
Take some of those multitudinous 2" strips you now have on hand.  Stack them up and cut 4" lengths of both golds and neutrals.  Lots of them.

 Pair a gold with a neutral and sew them together along one long edge.

Lots of them.

Press them open, pushing the seams toward the gold.

Lots of them.

Then start sewing the pairs together into elongated 4-patches.
And this is important.  Do not press the seams at this stage.  I repeat, resist the urge to press.

Keep sewing pairs together, then sew pairs to pairs, end to end, over and over and over.  Resist the urge to press.  Do not press.  (Seriously.  Don't do it.)
At some point, you can join everything together and start adding to each end, using the long chain as its own leader/ender.
When you run out of things to attach to this mega-strip, you have two choices.  If you're lucky, the ends will fit together with golds and lights in the right places so you can sew them together into one long hoop.  (And you don't even have to worry about twisting it!  Twists won't matter.)  If you're not so lucky, just piece a couple of twosies from neutral and gold squares and sew one to each end of your chain.  (Or you could cut 2" off one end, rotate it 180 degrees, and sew it to the other end.  Which will make more sense the second time you do this method...)
Do not press.

Seriously.  Do not press.
If you were lucky and now have a big giant loop, grab any seam you want and flatten that end on your cutting mat.

Line up the 2" mark on your ruler with edge of the strip.

And cut.

 Open it up and see what you've got!

A perfect 4-patch.
Peel back the top part of that long strip and expose the bottom part.  The left edge will have folded over and will now look like this.  And for those of you who weren't lucky in joining the ends of the strip - this is what your starting point looks like, with that twosie joined to the end of your strip.)

Line your ruler up again with that left edge, just like you did last time.  Cut.

And another one.  Notice how the twosie part closes itself  up?  That's why you didn't press - so that would happen.  It's a whole lot easier to cut the 4-patches if they're lining up to do half the work for you.
Keep cutting until you run out of things to cut.  Open and admire all your lovely little 4-patches.

And now you may press.  You're welcome.  (I know some of you were starting to twitch.  I was too at this point.)

So I counted up these 4-patches when I was done pressing.  Fifty of them.  Whew!  With the 68 from the last group, that gave me 118 out of 120.  For the last two, I can just cut squares.  Which I'll have to put off until next time, because it was time to go home and start supper.
So, clue 3 is (practically) a wrap.  Clue 2 is done.  Clue 1 stands at 257 out of 296 HSTs.

I think I've got a handle on Allietare so far.  And the secret sewing is progressing.  And there has even been continuing progress on the Twinkly project.

Now if I can just keep a close eye on those blood-thirsty scissors, I'll be fine...