Hive 6 September Tutorial - Funky Flying Geese Block

 Hello, my darling Hive 6! It's Nina, in beautiful Nova Scotia! This has been my first year with the Stash Bee (and basically my first year quilting) and it's been so much fun. I've really enjoyed sewing your blocks and learning more about quilting!

This month we're going to make a partially improv scrappy flying geese block using the "no waste" 4 at a time method. I love the graphic nature of the flying geese block, especially in multiples. It adds movement and rhythm to a quilt.

The finished block is 16.5" square.

I'm hoping the final quilt will look something like this:

FABRIC SELECTION:

I'm looking for cool colours for this quilt -- greens, blues and monochrome black/grey/white. You can use an off white if you like, as long as it's not too yellow. I prefer solids or blenders or tone on tone prints that read fairly solid. Modern prints preferred over traditional. But, at the end of the day, it's just a quilt and anything in your stash will be fine.

When you're composing your block, focus on pulling contrasting VALUES: a light, a dark and medium. You can mix colours, you can do it all one colour or you can just use black, white and grey, but the values of the colours you pick should be clearly differentiated.

Here's some examples I pulled from my stash: 

Multiple darks in the above photo.

Two possible lights in this photo, and I can either pick just one or use both.

The dark here is a darkish grey -- but you could use a black and then any of the greys could be the medium. It's all relative -- just consider the block.

The selection below uses a pale blue as the light. 

And you can mix greens and blues!

ASSIGN VALUES

You've got your fabric pull, now assign one value to each structural part of the block. There are three parts:

A: FLYING GEESE TRIANGLES 

B: FLYING GEESE BACKGROUND

C: SIDE SASHING

The flying geese are going to be made in a standard way. The tiny bit of improv comes into play for the side sashing. You can vary the widths of these pieces, you can piece them together in any way you like, but the overall effect should keep the value of the side sashing within the category you've picked for it: light, medium or dark.

CUTTING LIST

A: cut 1 piece 10" x 10" -- this fabric will be the flying geese triangles.

B: cut 4 pieces 5 1/2 x 5 1/2 -- this fabric will be the background of the flying geese. These can be scrappy, if you like, as long as they all read as the assigned tone in the context of the block -- i.e. dark, medium or light. Draw a line diagonally from corner to corner on the wrong side of each of these. Can use pen or pencil, you'll be cutting though this line later.

C: side sashing strips: I made one strip 9" x 16.5" and then just sliced it in two pieces vertically. That's the easiest way. Or you can piece it to make a strip 9 x 16.5 and then slice it. Or it can be two strips, one each of different fabric, whose widths add up to 9". Up to you. Again, if you're using more than one fabric make sure they all read as the assigned value for this unit.

A is the dark grey (flying geese triangles), B is the four white squares (flying geese background) and C is one solid strip of mid grey fabric 9" x 16.5" that I later split in two vertically. This is the simplest, most straightforward way to go for the sashing.

CONSTRUCTION

1. FOUR AT A TIME FLYING GEESE 

You'll need your A and B pieces and will make 4 units.

The flying geese units will each finish up 9" long by 4.5" deep (*before being sewed into the project)

You can follow this excellent tutorial at modernlymorgan.com

Or, if you prefer a video, try this one! https://youtu.be/_stvQx9cjEw

NB: Okay, these are supposed to be no waste -- you will have to trim the dog ears and you may need to trim a tiny bit to get the height to 4.5". If the width isn't quite 9" (or is too much) don't worry, we've got enough extra built in with the side sashing that the finished block will trim up just fine. Just get the height of each flying geese unit to 4.5"

1. Put two of the B squares on opposite corners on top of the A square, right sides together, with the diagonal line running all the way from one corner to the other. Sew 1/4" away from this line of each side of the line. 

Cut along the diagonal line.

This will give you two identical units, below. 

Set the seam by pressing just like this before you press the small triangles away from the big one. 

Now add your final two B squares, one to the top of each of these two units, in the top corner, right sides together, with the diagonal line running up and down:

Again, sew 1/4" away from this line on both sides of each unit and cut along the line. Do this for the two units and you'll now have four (only two pictured below).

Set the seam and then press the small triangles away from the large. You now have four flying geese units!

Check the measurements and trim them if needed, so that they measure 4.5" inches high and around 9" wide. Best way to do this is to trim the top edge of the unit so that it's straight and 1/4" away from the peak of the triangle.

Then trim:

Then I make sure the unit is 4.5" high, by trimming off the other side:

Then sew the four flying geese units together, top to bottom, like this, making a strip that measures 16.5" long.

If you haven't already cut your side sashing into two pieces, do that now. As long as one piece is least 2" wide (raw width) it'll be fine

I split this one into pieces that measure 2.5" wide and 6.5" wide

Sew them on each side of the four flying geese unit and you're done! Don't worry about trimming to size -- I can take care of that with my brand new giant 16.5" square ruler :) 

 Here's two units, below:

The blue block uses a simple pieced side sashing -- the values of the dark blues are so close it's hard to see. I pieced two pieces of dark blue 9" wide fabric together, trimmed to 16.5" long, cut it roughly in half. 

Here's a sample block that doesn't use white or off white as the light value (the super light strip is a pale ice green -- and the two contrasting side strips still read as lighter than the middle value). 

Anyway, I hope that's pretty clear. Make four flying geese units, sew them together in a row, sew some sashing on the sides! Don't sweat the details. I don't care which way you press seams. If a block is too short, I'll just piece it bigger! I'm very easy going and I know that anything you contribute will be so helpful and special to me.

Thank you so much for your help -- this is a project that's been in my mind for ages and I'm so grateful that it will commemorate what has been a marvellous year of sewing and camaraderie!