Category Archives: Beginning Quilter Tip

Tutorial Tuesday: Picture Perfect Flying Geese

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One of the first things I notice, when looking at a quilt, is the ends/points of the triangles (if there are triangles in the quilt).  I am my own worse critic and have been known to rip out stitches a time or six before I am satisfied with the points on my flying geese.

My 1/4″ seam allowance is checked three and four times before, during and after I am working on a quilt project.  I make sure to measure twice, cut once.  Even with all of that, I still find that I occasionally cut off points of triangles.

Then I had a revelation.  What can be done to keep from cutting off my triangle points?

RESIZE THE FLYING GEESE!

PPFG

This concept isn’t that difficult to understand although it will change the finished size of your blocks and quilt just a tad.

ADD 1/4″ to the strip you are sewing your top square to.  For example, with the tutorial below, the original size of my strip called for a 4 1/4″ x 8″ strip.  Instead, I cut the strip 4 1/2″ x 8″.  Follow the tutorial below to see how perfect your triangle points can be.

Fabric Requirements:

  • ONE (1) 8″ square focus fabric
  • FOUR (4) 4 1/4″ squares triangle/points fabric
  • FOUR (4) 4 1/2″ x 8″ strips flying geese strips
  • FOUR (4) 4 1/2″ squares block cornerstones

Tutorial:

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ONE (1) 8″ square

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FOUR (4) 4 1/4″ squares

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Draw a diagonal like, corner-to-corner, on the BACK side of the 4 1/4″ squares

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Line up the 4 1/4″ squares to the top corner of the 4 1/2″ x 8″ strips and sew ON the line you drew.

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Cut off the corner of the flying geese block, 1/4″ inch FROM the sewing line.

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Press your seam toward the 4 1/4″ square.

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Repeat the process to sew the second 4 1/4″ square to the opposite side of the 4 1/2″ x 8″ square.

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Trim off the corner fabric 1/4″ FROM the sewing line.

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Press toward the second corner.

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Using TWO (2) of the flying geese blocks, sew the 4 1/2″ cornerstones to the ends of both of your flying geese.

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With the remaining flying geese, sew them to the right and left sides of the 8″ square.  Press toward the center fabric.

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Pin and sew the top and bottom (the strips with the cornerstones) flying geese strips to the center section of the blocks.

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That’s all there is to it!  Now go forth and create Picture Perfect Flying Geese!

PPFG

Tutorial Tuesday: Half-Square Triangles

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Over and over again, half-square triangles (aka HSTs) are explained.  Over and over again, beginning quilters continue to have trouble making them.  I will add myself to debunk the HST myth.  It’s not magic, it’s just MATH!

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Start with two equal-sized squares*.  On the back side of the lightest square, draw a diagonal line, corner-to-corner, ONE (1) time.

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Diagonal line.

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With right sides together, sew 1/4″ on either side of the line you drew.

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Using a ruler and your rotary cutter, cut the square into triangles, ON the line you drew.

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Two triangles.

HST

Open them up and press toward the darkest fabric.  You have now made two HSTs!

*A little quilter’s tip – cut the squares a tad larger than your pattern calls for.  Once you have pressed your HSTs, you can then square them up to be the exact finished size your pattern requires.


Quilt Article: Quilt Notions for Novices by TK Harrison

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Social media is a great place to meet and greet other quilters, quilt professionals and manufacturers or distributors of quilt-related merchandise.  Where else can you have 2000 friends and only a couple dozen are family members?  Where else can you get (mostly) positive feedback on something you’ve accomplished and want to show it off to the your quilt world?

It’s also a great place to pick quilter’s brains!  Recently, I took an informal poll and asked my Facebook quilt friends:  “What are the TOP FIVE quilt notions you would recommend for a beginning quilter?”  The results were somewhat varied but what it really did was to make me put some thought into my own top five quilt notions that I would suggest to a beginning quilter.

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Geometric and Directional Fabric No-No

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All the quilting rage these days is to use geometric and directional fabric designs – now known as part of the modern quilt movement.  Mind you, there have been directional and geometric fabrics around for a long time, it’s just that a lot of the modern quilts are made with geometric and directional fabrics.  Sometimes though, this is not the best course of action for a beginning quilter.  A beginner can be as modern as they want…until they can’t.

When is that a problem?  Take a look at this quilt block:

6Crazy8-400

With the right fabrics (right being deemed by the modern quilt movement’s establishment) and colors, a simple log cabin quilt can become a thing of modern beauty.  Now take a closer look at the plaid red and white fabric strips.

I had been quilting for about 25 years when I made this quilt block.  And I made this “beginning quilter’s” mistake.  The lines on the fabric are not straight.

I can call this whatever I want – the fabric wasn’t printed straight on the grain, the fabric shifted when I cut it out, it’s handmade and looks handmade, etc. etc.  I can call it whatever I want to, but the truth is that I would never recommend this type geometric/directional fabric to a beginning quilter.  If a person who has been quilting for as long as I’ve been quilting cannot cut a straight line in the fabric, how can I expect a beginning quilter to do so?

Please remain calm.  This is not a post on bashing modern quilts.  It’s not a post on bashing fabric manufacturers.  This is a post outlining why I choose not to design quilts with geometric and/or directional fabrics – I design quilts for beginners and above!

If you are a beginning quilter and wish to make modern quilts, stick with a pleasing color palate without the geometric and dimensional fabrics.  You can grow into them as your quilting advances.  Or if you use those fabrics mentioned and your lines do not come out straight – go ahead and call your quilt a handmade modern quilt.