Geese Atop My Cabin

In 2012 I was visiting my mom in Western Washington and we just happened to go to some quilt stores.  If you didn't know, quilt stores often put quilts up in their bathrooms (a room I frequent) and I saw an amazing quilt in one of those bathrooms.  It was called Geese Atop My Cabin and it was an original pattern by someone in the shop.  It was in green and purple and I was in love.  I purchased the pattern but felt overwhelmed by trying to find the right fabrics.  Almost exactly one year later, I was visiting my mom and we just happened to go to some more quilt shops (yes, there's a pattern here).  She helped me choose some fabrics.  Now, nearly a year later, my version of this pattern is ready to be unveiled.

Here is the process of creating the blocks.  There are sixteen blocks that are all the same.  The purple fabrics are called logs and they make up the log cabin block.  The green triangles are called flying geese. 

I screwed up this block and had to seam rip all sixteen of these blocks.  I was not a happy camper. 

The flying geese are added on.  This wasn't too difficult but there was no easy way to chain sew them on. 

Adding the next log to my cabin with the geese.

Adding the final log to my cabin and the geese.  I made sixteen of these finished blocks.

At this point I had to decide on the layout of the finished quilt.  I tried a few out (like five or six different ways actually).  I like both of these layouts but I went with the top one because that's what the original pattern called for and my husband liked it too.  I may make another smaller one with a different layout. 

Here is the finished product.  I quilted the dark purple on the lines so you can't see it and the light purple is a random pattern I created myself.  This quilt was actually a beast to quilt.  The first quilting lines I did I had to rip out right away.  It was heavy and unwieldy.  The geese kept getting caught on everything in sight.  I was constantly wrestling with this quilt and trying to get it into position.  It measures 36 by 36 so it's not that big but it was tough.  If/when I make this pattern again, I will probably make it 2/3 size instead of full size.  Oh, and if you plan on pressing your seams open, don't use white thread to sew dark colors together.  I never press my seams open so I didn't even think about it.

But by the time I was finished I was proud of my work and hung it immediately. 

Here is a close up so you can see some of the quilting and also that the geese are three dimensional.  This last picture is also the best representation of the actual colors of the quilt.