Little Penguin Quilts Through the Year

Little Penguin Quilts Through the Year

Saturday, April 16, 2016

Quilty Math

I was a pretty good math student in school, and math was always one of my favorite subjects to teach to my 5th graders, but I am finding quilt math to be a bit challenging.  Fortunately, I don't have to do it very often!   This afternoon I've been playing with my Flying Geese blocks a little bit more.  I decided I wanted to make some that were half the size of the original ones I made last week.

Following the Connecting Threads tutorial again, but this time cutting all the dimensions in half, should give me some half size geese units, shouldn't it?!?  Look at all the math I had to do:


I made two new sets of flying geese units using the dimensions I figured out and here's how they turned out - 


They were a little bit more than half of my original units.  Looking back at the tutorial, and at my chicken scratches, I just realized that my mistake wasn't in the math, it was in getting confused between the "actual" size of the blocks and the "finished" size!  Oh well, that is how you learn, right?  It's a good thing I am just playing and not making something for an actual pattern.


Adding some solid strips and squaring up helps a lot!


And playing again with a layout (maybe for a red, white, and blue table topper for my dining room table), shows the new possibilities!

I'll be sharing over at Oh Scrap! at Quilting is More Fun than Housework tomorrow!




8 comments:

Christine B said...

Your flying geese look fabulous in both sizes! I agree with the maths element of quilting being a bit confusing at times... I find that too! Christine x

Kaja said...

Even the idea of quilt maths makes my head hurt! Even if they weren't the size you wanted your geese look good and I like the layout you are playing around with.

Vicki in MN said...

Well I am not great with math, usually I make DH help with that, LOL Love where you are going with your playing though! I like using the Fons and Porter flying geese ruler for my geese. I got it at Jo Ann's.

Linda @ kokaquilts said...

hm-m-m- Maths 101, not my strongest point either! I love what you ended up with, great colours & layout!

Robby said...

I enjoy math, I was the annoying kid who always knew the story problem answer. My problem is over-thinking the problem. If I just follow my instincts I'm good, but the harder I try the more likely an error will creep in, and those seam allowances are sneaky devils.

Cynthia Brunz Designs said...

I like the direction you are going with this. Thanks for sharing with Oh Scrap! It is going to look great on your table.

gayle said...

It's those seam allowances that will trip you up every time!
Love your geese - and they look like they're fun to play with!

Kate @ Smiles From Kate said...

I love to play, every time I do it I think why don't I do this more often? The main thing to remember with geese is the width is always twice the depth when finished. I can never figure out how to make them four at a time though, they always turn out wrong.