Flying Geese Scrap Tip

Wow - hello, two weeks later!  I have been offline this week (and  owe a few back emails....)so that post I intended to do last Monday kinda went the wayside. I won't bore you with too many of the details but I'll tell you that it involved a ton of subbing, getting panicky over the arrival dates of ordered sewing supplies (which led to frantic sewing on all things I have right here so that when said arrivals actually happen I can hit the ground with the sewing machine running), an improv evening masquerading as a Bond girl/spy, and a day of guest directing for the upcoming Christmas dinner theatre of "Sorry! Wrong Chimney!" in Eston, SK, which was soooo much fun.  (PS - if you're looking for a pleasant drive, and a fun farce by really lovely and talented folks, you should totally go.  They've put together a heck of a show! Dec 6, 7, and 8) Phew! If you're exhausted just reading that, I don't blame you.  You can understand why I've been falling asleep a little before I go to bed lately.  :-)

Decent wig, eh?  (Save the ragged bangs.) Add in a very thick Russian accent, red lipstick and gold lame and you get the picture...  "Ah, pleh-zure to meet you, Meester Bond."

Anyhoo!  In my frantic sewing of things I can't share for another month, I did have the wherewithal to snap a few photos of a trick I came up with while working on my Swoon, since the project I'm working on has similar building blocks.

If you've spent any time reading this blog, then you know I love scraps and hate wasting even the tiniest of pieces when they can become something else.  Flying geese blocks have potential for a lot of waste. However, if you take a little bit of time (which is negligible if you're already marking lines), you can actually have the scraps sewn together before you even trim your geese.

This method only works if you're using squares and rectangles to build your geese. If you're using triangles, you've got different scraps entirely and will have to find other scrap-saving tips. :-)

Flying Geese Scrap Saver Tip:
Step 1) When marking your diagonal sewing line on your square, draw a second line 1/2" away from the first.

Step 2) When positioning the square on the rectangle, face the second line towards the corner of the rectangle as opposed to the centre side. If you've sewn flying geese before, you're familiar with which side is the scrap side.  You want the second line on the scrap side of things.

Step 3)  Chain piece:  Sew along the first line to make your flying geese block.  Turn your chain of geese around.

Step 4) Chain piece: Sew along second pencil line.

Step 5) Trim/cut your flying geese blocks between the pencil lines - 1/4" from each - to separate the block from the scrap.

It's tidier if you use a rotary cutter but scissors work, too.

Step 6) Viola!  You have both a flying geese block and a bonus half-square triangle ready to square up for use in another project.

For the record, on HSTs I recommend pressing seams open but as this was the ONLY one I pressed that day, I went with the quick press-to-the-side.  Geese I always press towards the outside.

The size of the half-square block will truly depend on the size of your flying geese but a reliable estimate is subtract 1" from the short side measurement of the geese block for your HST.  For example:  my geese block unfinished is 2.5" and the HST trims to 1.5".  Obviously it's small but if you're geese are larger, so are your HSTs.  The Swoon has 3.5" flying geese and my HSTs trimmed to 2.5"...  Regardless, they are already sewn and you don't have to mess with bias-cut tiny scraps.  Yay!!

Okay, off to return back emails and race out for batting.  I foresee many sore safety pin-poked fingers in my near future....

Organizing: Jewelry wrestled, fabric tackled

As I've mentioned, I've been on a rampage.  Cleaning, organizing, editing, revising. My space, my things, my life, my mindset.

I've made some significant progress on the first two. :-) ( I imagine I'll be working on the last two for eternity. As we all should be, really.)

My jewelry drawer has been a source of constant frustration for a long time.  I wandered into an aisle in the grocery store the other day and came home with some inexpensive ceramic dishes.

I cut into some leftover felt that I made (from the Scrappy Afghan that is no longer such - more on that another time...) to line them and prevent scratches.

Et voila!

Little tip I picked up from Martha:  Use spare buttons to keep pairs of earrings together.  Thread them through the holes and they don't get lost.  OR if you lose one, you lose both - out of sight, out of mind. :-)

And after seeing many organized fabric stashes around the interwebs, I finally bought some comic book boards.  Mini bolts.  Love them.

Yeah, this isn't all of it.  There are more mini bolts behind this stack and in the bin to the left...

And now that I once again know what I have, I used a big chunk to sew a spring top. (Coming soon to a blog that might be this one. :-)  

Cuff 'Em!

I had a pile of socks that had given up the ghost and had holes beyond repair that, for some strange reason, I was reluctant to throw away. When organizing my yarn stash, I came across a use for the cuffs.

Cut the cuff off the sock and use it to hold together a partially-used skein. The loose ends are secured underneath it, the ball band can be kept with the ball, many can be thrown haphazard into a pile without fear they will tangle, and a center-pull ball can stay that way without the outer end twisting and knotting while the center end is worked. The sock cuff will tighten around the skein as it's used.  And they will never snag your yarn.

Why the heck didn't I think of this before?