Seriously Summer Quilt

I've had this quilt pictured in my mind for a while now. A long while. The fabric has been sitting on my Anna Maria Horner shelf for what seems like forever and the whole project was on hold until I found the perfect quilt pattern to compliment the fabrics. The fabric here is cotton voile from Anna Maria Horner's Little Folks like from like 7 years ago (I said I've had it for a while).





This quilt is entitled Seriously Summer because these colors perfectly reflect my summer mood. This summer has been filled with brightness and sheer joy so far. A close girlfriend from high school is getting married and her wedding has spurred a reconnection between our group of girlfriends from high school. We were such a tight-knit group and I can't think of another word to describe our relationship other than that were were simply obsessed with one another. While these colors don't exactly mimic the colors that were ubiquitous in our high school wardrobes (think hot pink, cheetah print, puff paint, and glitter), they emulate the excitement felt when we are reunited.







The pattern I finally chose was Anna Maria Horner's Mother Goose pattern. I've always wanted to try my hand at Flying Geese blocks (see my Bucket List), and I am pumped to knock another quilt off the list.

The pattern uses a combination of solids and prints to form the flying geese blocks.

Here is the construction of one of the blocks, following all of the instructions Anna Maria provided with just a few adjustments, which actually makes (4) finished flying geese blocks:

 (After testing out a block, I determined that it was necessary for me to scoot the small squares in a bit so that I had a little extra seam allowance in the point of the block)

After some sewing, pressing, and rotary cutting you magically end up with (4) of the same flying geese blocks.

Some more piecing pictures for your pleasure:

 

The pattern uses 105 of the finished flying geese blocks made from 26 main blocks, which means you actually don't use (3) of the blocks which is no big deal. 
 




Overall I though that the pattern was great. I think that it produced a great looking quilt. A couple of notes that I have are as follows:

1) It makes the quilt look better overall if you arrange the blocks so that there are some "Full V's". I'm not sure how else to describe what I mean, but if you look above and see a combination of the Goose and the Sky blocks in the same fabric, they make a much better looking quilt. 

2) I would HIGHLY recommend using either plain or non-geometric prints for the "sky" blocks because it was a PITA for me to match up the correct way for the sky part of the blocks to go. I also didn't pay that much attention until about 1/2 way through the construction of the blocks, which is totally my fault obviously.

3) I would highly recommend scooting the small sky blocks in a little bit when sewing them to the goose block, just like I showed in the picture above. It really helped with my seam allowance so I had nice and perfect points about 95% of the time. 

4) I also kinda like the look of alternating the direction of the geometric prints for goose blocks, but that could just be me.

I have actually decided to try hand quilting this baby. I figured that for my first try at hand quilting cotton voile would  be a dream because it is so light, soft, and airy. I thought that if I couldn't hack it with the voile, then I knew hand quilting is totally out of the question for me. I am going to use Anna Maria Horner's hand quilting tutorial using perle cotton, and I am so excited!

Check back soon to see results, maybe within the next 2 week (hopefully). 

HOLLER! 

 

(Hint: I'm the dark haired one in the middle)