Flying Geese Quilt:

Our local quilt guild has an annual judged quilt show and this year the block theme was flying geese.  There are many ways to sew these blocks, sew triangles, rectangle and squares, one seam, no waste (four blocks at a time), etc.  Making 4 at a time is my favorite, but was not appropriate for this project.  I wanted to use up some of the pieces from my scrap bag (they were peeking over the top of the bag) and my blocks were a finished 2” x 1”.  So I tried the one seam method.  After working out a few bugs, I really like this method and my finished produce looks really good.

For my finished 3" x 1 1/2" goose, I started with two 2" x 2" sky (background) and one 3 1/2" x 2" goose.  The goose fabric is folded wrong sides together with the fold on the top.  Sew the 1/4" seam on the right side of the block.  Were the wooden stick is placed.

My first attempt with the one seam technique produced a great block; however the 1/4” seam allowance on the top of the top of the block was not perfect, or even near perfect. 

 

 

 

So instead of making my planned finished 3” x 1 1/2” block, it became a 2” x 1”.  My problem was the top square wanted to shift slightly when I sewed the one seam.  If I placed the block slightly above the bottom block, I had great success with the top edge being straight.  My need for nicely trimmed blocks led to all of the blocks being cut to the small size.

 

 

To keep the goose from shifting, I sewed a 1/4" stabilizing seam.  Due to this seam, quilting was somewhat difficult.  The sewing machine pressure foot kept getting caught on the little “lip” of the goose stabilizing seam.  I ended up using a water solvable stabilizer on the top of the quilt.  It worked great!  I will definitely keep this product close by for future use.

 

 
 

I love to use Bonnie Hunter’s idea of beginners and enders.  I start with cutting a stack of 5” or 6” squares and stack them by my sewing area.  If I have a special pattern in mind, I will separate the squares into separate stacks.  For example, half square triangles.  As I sew my main project, I will start each sewing session with a beginner and stop with an ender.  Before long I have enough blocks sewn together for strips and then a quilt top.  Usually I keep the beginner/ ender project small for baby quilts.  I then donate the completed top to my local guild for finishing and then to the local head start program.

I fool like I get two gold stars, one for the donation and the second by getting some unused fabric out of my sewing room.  We all have pieces that we liked in the store, we’re given as handy-downs, or pieces left over from a previous project that we just don’t know what to do with.  Try giving yourself two gold stars!