Hive 12 - July Block Tutorial

Hello, my name is Laura Wolverton.  I have a blog/quilt journal at SewFrouFrou Quilter (in college, my friends use to tease that I would definitely like this or that because it was "frou from"); I can be found on Flickr and Instagram by the same name too.  I live in Indiana, in a small town just east of Indianapolis with my 3 children and my husband, Steve.

 My mother sewed clothing and made quilts when I was a child.  I have to be honest--I had no interest back then in that ugly country fabric that she was using.  It wasn't until I had my first child that I began noticing the nicer, more modern fabrics in her quilts and I became interested.  Around 2002-2003, there was a bookstore in the lobby of the building that I worked and I bought 2 quilting books:  one on designing your own quilts and the other was on Baltimore Album quilts.  I initially attempted to design and sew a quilt with an old machine that belonged to my grandfather (not a nice vintage machine but rather a little darning machine that I think he may have bought at Woolworth's to hem his pants).  It didn't go well so I put the idea on a back burner.   Around 2009, my mom bought Singer sewing machines for both my sister and me for Christmas because we both had (finally) exhibited an interest in sewing.  I think she was a little tired of us asking her to hem things--which I finally understand now:).   I was so worried about wasting fabric that I made a few pairs of pajamas for the kids before I finally started quilting.  It wasn't long before I had a stack of WIPs.  Only 2 of my finishes live at my house so far--my son's quilt (in the above photo) and my husband's T-shirt quilt (which I finally finished a few months ago after cutting all his running shirts up 2 years ago).  I am trying frantically to finish a quilt for my youngest daughter before her birthday this month because I've had the fabric for maybe 2 years now.  And my oldest daughter has requested a triangle quilt out of Echino fabrics -- so I am slowly collecting fabrics for that too.

How do I organize my stash?  Not very well.  I have tried to organize by color but usually it tends to gravitate back to the fabrics I bought together or   I keep my non-designated stash fabric and scraps in this cabinet that used to belong to my grandparents.  Random fabric scraps are kept in the containers above the cabinet.

I have a few special project stacks like my Ruby fabric for my future Swoon quilt, my AMH cuts, and some fat quarter bundles I have that I haven't found a purpose for yet that I keep in a bookcase along with some yarn and quilting books.

Fabric and projects I am currently working on are kept on/in my cutting table.

Who are your favorite designers?  Bonnie and Camille, Anna Marie Horner, Bari J, Pat Bravo.  I pretty much love anything that Art Gallery puts out.

What is one thing you have learned that you wish you knew when you first started quilting?  Never be afraid to do something because it looks hard.  Last year, I made paper piecing a goal and was so surprised at how easy it was (granted, I haven't tackled anything with 100 pieces yet or done an entire quilt of paper pieced blocks).

What is your favorite sewing/quilting tool and why should we all go out and buy it?  That's a hard one.  I love my rotating mat for when I am squaring up small blocks and HST's.  I also love my little Tweezer girl that I use to pick the paper out of paper pieced blocks.  Probably the most helpful tool I have though are my Ott lights since most of my sewing is done at night.

Who is your favorite fictional character?  My all time favorite character is Scarlett O'Hara from Gone with the Wind.  I like that family was so important to her; she may not have been the nicest to her sisters but she usually had the greater good of her entire family in mind.  I hated that she had the love of her life right there and spent all her time trying to get Ashley to fall in love with her.  Ashley would never understand her or appreciate her personality.

The Block:  I have been bookmarking so many different block tutorials and ideas and finally chucked them all and decided to design my own block.  My first design didn't work out, it was going to be too big but I was able to use all the pieces for the block design that we are doing here.  I am calling this block "ROYGB Geese" it is a 14 1/2 inch block.

For the fabrics, I want the block to be very scrappy.  I would like the geese to be  a range of different colored prints. You can use whatever you like--I tend to go for color shades that are a little left or right of primary colors.  I honestly just grabbed fabrics from my stash that never seem to go with anything and I think they work together. I would like a variety of low volume fabrics for the sky part of the geese.  I used a different fabric for each color of geese but if you don't have 5 different low volume fabrics, I understand.  I have been on a low volume bender for a few months now and have amassed quite a collection.  

The center block, I would like it to have mustard and peachy pink or rose colors in it.  Below is a picture of several other fabrics from my stash that I think would fit this criteria just to give you an idea of what I am looking for.--it doesn't have to be primarily mustard or primarily pink.  Honestly, if you don't have anything that works, just let me know and I can either send you some fabric or you can just send me your geese strips and I can add the center square to it.

Fabric Cutting:  

5 different colored fabrics fabrics for the geese:   5 1/4 in. square (one of each color)

Variety of low volume fabrics (I used 5 but you could easily use more):  2 7/8 in. square (you will need 20 squares total-I used 4 of each of the 5 fabrics)

1 Center square (with mustard/peach or rose tones):  6 1/2 in. square 

For the geese, I used the no waste method for flying geese.  You can find a detailed tutorial here.  Once you have your 20 geese made, arrange your geese so that there is one of each color goose on each side of the block so that they are going in the same direction around the block (see finished block above).  You'll probably notice that I tried to do it in ROYGB order and messed up one side-I didn't fix it-so don't feel that you have to do it in a certain order either unless it makes it easier for you.  You will then sew your geese strips as noted in the picture below:

 Sew the 3 geese strips to the top and the bottom of your center square.  (I don't care if you press open or to the side.  I usually do it to the side unless someone specifies they want them open because I think my machine handles that better.)  Press your seams.  Attach the 7 geese strips to the left and right sides of your block.  Press.   Do not square up your block, I will do it.  Thank you.  I hope you have fun with this--I'm very excited about it and can't wait to see what you do.