Ho Ho Ho and On We Sew - Free Pattern & Giveaway!

Welcome to my stop on the Ho Ho Ho and on we Sew monthly tutorial and link up party hosted by Fiona @ Celtic Thistle Stitches and Paula@ Mud Pies and Pins.  Yes it is only June and Christmas in July hasn't even started yet, but some of us are making gifts all year long.  Holiday makes don't have to be just for the holidays or even from Christmas themed fabric.  Today I am showing you how to make flying geese 4 at a time and so you can make this free pattern I designed for my stop on the hop, called So Frosty!  (I used Tula Pink Acacia with some pale blue print and solid Kona Snow for my version.) 

Included with today's tutorial/pattern, at the bottom of this post, is a giveaway from Fat Quarter shop for a mini charm pack of your choice and the Ho Ho Ho and On We Sew Linky party where you can enter and link up all your holiday makes or hand made gifts.

The linky party is open until the end of the month and random number generator will choose a winner!

So Frosty is a big block quilt, making a 72" x 72" lap quilt.  It's a quick make and perfect for a gift.  Fabric selection makes a big difference to this block.  Even though this fabric comes from a Christmas collection doesn't this one look very 4th of July?

Downton Abbey anyone?

Or maybe a child quilt for a special birthday?

I have to include at least one more traditional holiday though don't I?

The block is made up of squares and flying geese.  As there are so many geese I wrote the pattern (Download Here) using the no waste method which makes 4 flying geese at a time.

Flying geese are traditionally twice as long as they are tall.  There are a number of ways to make them.

The no waste method uses a large square for the Goose fabric and 4 smaller squares for the Sky.

To start with you need a square the finished length of your goose +1 1/4".  For the Sky squares you need the finished height of your goose +7/8".

So Frosty being a big block quilt uses 12 1/2" x 6 1/2" Flying Geese unfinished (1/2" for seam allowance) or 12" x 6" finished.  So I've used a Goose fabric (white) of 13 1/4" x 13 1/4" square and placed 2 of my Sky squares (pale blue) 6 7/8" on two opposing corners.

1. Mark a diagonal line from corner to corner.
2. Sew 1/4" on either side of this line.
3. Cut into two pieces along your marked line.
4. Press open.
5. Take your remaining 6 7/8" squares and place on the corners of one of your pieces as shown.
6. Mark a diagonal line and sew 1/4" on either side
7. Cut along your marked line.
8. Press open and you should have 2 identical flying geese.
9. Repeat for the remaining piece to make 4 flying geese units!

Here's a summary image  if you should ever want to refer to this method in the future! Large flying geese blocks like these make this pattern a very quick make.


So on with the linky party.  Please link up your gifts and holiday makes and the winner of the mini-charm pack will be selected at the end of the month by Random number generator.

Thanks for visiting my blog on the hop and I hope you have fun with So Frosty.  If you do make your own version of this quilt I'd love to see it - please get in touch (email and social media buttons are at the top of the page!)
 

Make Modern Magazine & Pattern Release

It may have seemed a little quiet on the blog but it's not due to lack of quilting related activities!   Last year, Make Modern Magazine published my colour block pattern called Storybook. 

It gives instructions for a baby quilt (40"x40") made from 5" charm squares and a bed size quilt (90" x 72") made from 10" layer cake squares which I made for my mum.  I love how it looks in her bedroom and keep wanting to steal it back!

I've had a second design accepted and am working hard on that at the moment for issue 5.  It will be an 84" x 84" (biggest quilt I've ever made myself!) based on this arrows idea I shared last year in the Around the World Blog Hop.  I can't show you pattern or in progress details on this one just yet but I'm making good progress.

In the meantime, Make Modern have reduced their subscription prices and are now offering individual magazines at $6.95AU, about €5 which is a great price for a quilting magazine! 

One of the other big pluses about publishing patterns in Make Modern, is that after the issue is replaced by the next one, the pattern rights revert back to the designer. 

So, I now get to sell my pattern on my own blog!  I re-formatted it to add more detail for the layer cake version and lots of photos.  Suzanne, in our Just Threads sewing group comes from a Quality Assurance background and inspected the language and instructions thoroughly!  She even made a quilt!  Suzanne added in some solid fabric to the outer border and had some charm squares left over to make a cushion.  Fabrics are Good Fortune by Kate Spain and I love Suzanne's swirly quilting!  Thank you so much Suzanne!
  

Due to the EU VAT laws, I'm offering the pattern through Payhip (who look after all the VAT for me!) and have updated the blog header and added a new Pattern Shop page. It's all very exciting and I have to thank Kristy, Jane and Lara at Make Modern for this and placing me on the path to writing a pattern!

The blog header images are licenced from Clipartof.com and as soon as I saw the Jack Russell and Basset Hound images, I had to buy them - they are the spitting image of Charly and Wilbur and even capture their personalities perfectly. 

So while I get cracking on finishing pattern number 2, I hope you will visit Make Modern Magazine and their blog page where you will find previews, prizes and guest posts.

Linking up this week to Thankful Thursday @ Quilting Jetgirl.  Next week, fingers crossed I'll have a Night Sky finished Quilt to share in time for Jana Machado's Quilt-A-Long on the 25th.