Geese in the Garden with Island Batik

Flying Geese.  Such a classic unit in quilting.  June's Island Batik challenge celebrates this quilting staple by requiring that our projects contain and focus on flying geese.  

The additional element to the challenge is that we had to use one of the pre-cuts from our January ambassador boxes.  I had a 10" stack of Sunshine Garden by Kathy Engle (a signature collection for Terri of Lizard Creek Quilting) that I was dying to use. I love the colors in Sunshine Garden, so bright and sunny.  I loved the idea of a garden, and as I thought about it, I decided that Geese In The Garden made sense as a concept and a title.

I knew that I would use my Accuquilt Go! Cube to make my flying geese, as that is my favorite method.  I have three different flower dies for my Accuquilt, so that would give me flowers for my garden.  Geese are, of course, birds, but I also have a bird die, so that added more life to my garden.  And then when I was looking for birds in EQ to get a basic feel for what I was imagining, I saw butterflies in EQ.  The butterfly die was the first non-geometric die I bought when I first got my Accuquilt!  So this garden was really coming together, and I hadn't sewn anything yet.

I made the geese first, using the greens and blues in Sunshine Garden as the big triangle/geese, and the basic Rice as the background.  Lately I've been playing with using more than one background fabric in a quilt, so I tried that in EQ and liked it, so the applique blocks have a different basic, Sky, as the background.  The difference turned out to be more subtle than I intended, but I still like the look.

 

There are a total of 88 Flying Geese units in this quilt. I used all 20 fabrics from the Sunshine Garden line, plus the Sky & Rice used in the background, and solid Lime Green for the binding.  I did all the stitching with a Schmetz non-stick needle--they are great when there is fusible web in a project, they don't gum up at all.  

I used a variety of Aurifil threads for the applique and I used color 2770 Very Light Delft for the organic wavy line quilting. The batting is Hobbs Poly-Down batting, which is a nice, light polyester batting.  

 

One of Fire Monkey's good friends just got a new baby sister and this will be gifted to Baby Poppy.  Had I known her name, I could have made one of the flowers a Poppy!  But alas, I had the top done before she was born. It finished at 42" square, a good size for a baby to grow into -- it's important to me that baby quilts be usable for many years, not just in baby stage.  Fire Monkey wanted to demonstrate that you don't have to be a baby to enjoy this quilt!

Sunshine Garden has already begun appearing in quilt shops.  Here are a few shops that carry these beautiful, summery fabrics:

• Sew What Fabrics/Batiks Etc * Virginia
• My Very Own Quilt Shop * Minnesota
• Ben's Five and Dime * Iowa
• Boutique 4 Quilters * Florida
• Hunters Quilt Mart * Missouri
• Olive Juice Quilts * Wisconsin
• Mill End Store * Oregon

Materials used in this project were given to me by Island Batik, Aurifil, Hobbs, Accuquilt, and Schmetz.