Evening in the Garden Quilts

Adventures in Fabric Art

Tag Archives: flying geese


by 4 Comments

Finished Commission Quilt

IMG_2905(1)This quilt seemed to take forever, but it was really only about a week of sewing.  The customer started talking to me about it in early August.  We arrived at a design, then she chose all her fabrics, then sent the links to me,  I ordered the fabric, and then awaited it’s arrival.  I started sewing the first week in October, but stopped to do other projects while waiting for that last piece of fabric to arrive.  By that time, I had the back and binding made, so construction went smoothly.  These are big geese, ten-inch blocks!

IMG_2908Quilting took a little longer, because a lot of it was straight lines with the walking foot.  At 70″ x 90″, this was fairly large and took a lot of free-motion quilting after the lines, but after the Layer Cake Explosion, it was a breeze!  It’s all quilted, top and bottom, with Superior Threads Bottom Line in silver.

IMG_2909I should get this in the mail on Monday.  Whew!

I’m enjoying seeing your finishes this week!

I’m linking up to Finish it up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts.


by 4 Comments

Finished: Baby Geese 3

IMG_2308This week I finished the last (hopefully!)  of the Flying Geese baby quilts.  This was a completely unplanned series, started when I was looking for a pattern to use up some 6 1/2″ little boy scraps.  Then I used some bits of yardage to make the pink quilt where the geese change directions.  Finally, I made this to use this cotton lawn yardage and 3 1/2″ pink scraps (cut to 3 1/4″ for the 5 1/2 ” blocks) and some 6 1/2″ flowered squares.

IMG_2311pmThis one is not as graphic as the others, but it’s my favorite.  I love the variety of pinks, and I like the way the black and white looks against them.  It’s quilted with three rows of large, curvy free-motion feathers (in Superior’s pink Bottom Line, top and bottom) that were quick and fun to do.  I used an irregular black and white stripe to bind it.

IMG_2311The lawn fabric (the geese, and both prints on the back) had intimidated me for a while.  (I think I bought it online without noticing that it wasn’t quilting cotton.)  Once I starched it up and pressed it, it behaved very well.  There’s a little stretch to it, but the starch helped.  It’s also a bit transparent, but I pressed seams away from it, and everything looks good.

2015-03-18 15.15.18One problem was that the smaller flowers are printed very crooked, and they look a little funky on the back.  I used every last bit of these fabrics, so there wasn’t much I could do, and it’s okay.  The cat helps hide them, anyway.

PicMonkey CollageWhich one is your favorite?  I like them all, but I really like the last one, just in time for Spring.  Now that I’ve completed this fun exploration of Flying Geese, I need to return to my March goals.  I’m working on Clue 3 for Scrap in a Box.  I’ll show you that later.

wind_dandelion3Good luck on all your finishes.  I’m linking up to WIPs Be Gone at A Quilting Reader’s Garden.  Not that this has been in-progress very long, but Angie likes me to share!  And to Let’s Make Baby Quilts! at Michelle’s Romantic Tangle.


by 4 Comments

Finish: Baby Geese 2

IMG_2288pYesterday I finished up another take on the geese, and I like it a lot.  You can see the Flea Market Fancy in it, but I also used up lots of old pinks from my stash, including a pink Jinny Beyer check that might be from the early nineties.

IMG_2289Since I was cutting yardage, sometimes small bits, I made these blocks 6″ finished, easy to cut and sew and calculate.  The quilt finishes at 36″ x 42″.

IMG_2297I used the walking foot with pale yellow Bottom Line by Superior to stitch between all the blocks to keep it square.  Then I switched to free motion and did a small stipple over all the background triangles.  I was worried that dense quilting might make it stiff, but its not at all, and the unquilted geese are especially soft and nice.  Warm and White batting.

IMG_2287I am in love with the rose batik I used for the back.

IMG_2299Stay tuned for version 3, which may be the last of the series!

wind_dandelion3Go to WIPs Be Gone at A Quilting Reader’s Garden to see more finishes.


by 1 Comment

Sunday Stash Report: 3/15/15

IMG_2284The weather here is much improved, and I took pictures of this completed quilt this morning. There will be a post about it later.  It used three and a half yards, and I didn’t buy any.  That can’t last long.  I’m beginning to spot thin places in the stash.

This week:  + 0 yards,  – 3.5 yards
This year:  + 26.5 yards,  – 49.25 yards
Net fabric destashed  in 2015:  22.75 yards

2015-03-14 10.12.21What I did buy was a new sewing chair!  I had put this off because I really liked the looks of my old one (an unusual pink/red color), but it really didn’t like my back.  Office Max has lots of it’s chairs on sale, and this is a mid-price one, rated for 6-8 hours at a time.  Sounds about right, hmmm?  I haven’t used it for that long yet, but after a few hours I’m very happy with it.  The height adjusts, and the (short) arms flip up.  It also is much heavier and has broader legs than my old one, so maybe it won’t flip out from under me when I reach for something!

Take care of yourselves, and keep using that stash!  I’m linking up to Patchwork Times.


by 5 Comments

Sunday Stash Report: 3/8/15

image

This post is brought to you by Yuri, who says every quilter needs an attractive paper weight.  Actually, he had a strong belief last evening that it was time to feed the cats, and was hoping that if he sat on something important enough I would have to stop my work.  Or that he could stare me into submission.  I had already yelled him for trying to remove pins from my piecing.  I did make him wait till I finished my block.  So there.

No fabric bought, and I used 3 1/2 yards for the Geese baby quilt.

This week:  + 0 yards,  – 3.5 yards
This year:  + 26.5 yards,  – 45.75 yards
Net fabric destashed  in 2015:  19.25 yards

Hope all of you are moving your stash in the right direction!  I’m linking up to Patchwork Times.


by 7 Comments

Geese Finish

2015-03-06 11.07.16I finished the Geese baby quilt (38″ x 44″) made with Kona Ash and the bright “boy” scraps.  I am really happy with the way it turned out.  I took these photos in the bright sun just to show the quilting.

IMG_2283The quilting is all done with gray Bottom Line by Superior.  I wanted it to just be texture and shadows, no additional color.  The horizontal and vertical lines are all done with the walking foot, then I did the diagonals and the echo quilting in free motion.  It was a little hard to distinguish the geese that are flying horizontally, so I echo quilted inside of them, and I like the result.

IMG_2276The scraps include whales, construction trucks,  baseball equipment, and Mickey Mouse.  I was cleaning out my 6 1/2″ squares, so I made 51/2″finished  blocks to make the most of the fabric.  I used the two-squares-and-a-rectangle method, and this very handy chart to calculate sizes.

2015-03-06 11.07.36This is only the second Flying Geese quilt I’ve ever made, and the other was long ago.  I loved how easily and precisely the blocks went together using this method.  Now I’m going to do another, busier one using pinks!

2015-03-06 11.08.18Can’t wait to see your finishes!  I’m linking up to Whoop Whoop Friday at Confessions of a Fabric Addict.

wpid-cooltext-whoop-whoop.png.png


by 6 Comments

WIP Wednesday: Geese

image

image

Just a quick one to show you what I’m doing (instead of any of my goals!).  I put together a scrappy Flying Geese quilt, and now I’m marking geese in the solid areas to quilt.  So far, so good.

image

While I pieced this and my last two projects, I’ve been working on this (my first) leaders and enders project, and am starting to see some progress.  I like doing it, and it eliminates lots of threads, but I don’t promise I’ll always be organized enough to do it.  I recently did some cleaning in the studio, which makes it possible to locate the basket when I get ready to piece.  (Someday this will be a “Frilly” quilt like Pam made.

Hope all of you are making progress!  I’m linking up to WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced.