#CREATIVE GRIDS FLYING GEESE RULER HOW TO#

Once everything is lined up, trim off the fabric that overhangs past the top and right side of the ruler. The last step is making sure your inside flying geese angles line up with the dots (45 degree angle) and I’ve illustrated this with the blue line on one side and left it off the other side so you can see. Make sure your flying geese point is still on the 2.75″ mark and is 1/4″ above the edge of the geese ( seam allowance)…this is illustrated with the pink circle and arrow. Since the example is 3″ x 5.5″, I’m going to line up the edges we just trimmed along the 3″ and 5.5″ marks (shown below with the black lines). We already know where the center should be (2.75″) BUT this time we need to consider the height of the flying geese we are trying to get. Now the remaining two sides need to be trimmed so flip your block so that the point is now facing downward. Once everything is lined up, trim off fabric that overhangs past the edge of the ruler to the top and right sides.

#CREATIVE GRIDS FLYING GEESE RULER HOW TO#

Some rulers have these angles marked but I want to show how to do it if you’re ruler doesn’t. ALSO, you will line up the inside flying geese angles along the dots shown in a 45 degree angle ( I illustrated this with the blue line on one side but left the other side blank so you can see the dots and how they line up). For this example, the center point is on 2.75. Once you’ve figured out the middle point for your flying geese, you are going to put the point of your flying geese 1/4″ below the top edge of the ruler ( this is circled in pink)…you do this because you need that 1/4″ for your seam allowance as I mentioned earlier.

EXAMPLE: my block in this tutorial needs to be trimmed to 3″ x 5.5″ ( keep in mind that the sewn in/finished size will be 2.5″ x 5″ because you lose 1/2″ total from the sides once it’s ‘sewn in’ 😉), so I’ll take the width of 5.5 and divide it by 2. Take the size flying geese width that you’re trying to get and divide it in half ( make sure you’re using the actual block size and not the ‘sewn in/finished’ size). With this method you have to de a little math…but don’t worry, it’s not too hard! First, you need to figure out where the middle of your block should be. It’s also a great size so you’ll be able to use it for a lot of cutting, not just for flying geese. Like I said earlier, any quilting ruler with grid markings every 1/4″ will do and this Omnigrid ruler makes it really easy to see where you need to cut. Just be mindful of this!ĪLSO…no matter which method you use, I always recommend testing it first on some scraps before cutting/trimming your blocks! It’s a pretty horrible feeling to cut all your blocks the wrong size… trust me, I’ve been there! One very important thing that I want you to keep in mind is that you ALWAYS need to make sure you have 1/4″ above the point to guarantee pointy points and accuracy! The photo below shows what I’m talking about and the little purple marker is 1/4″:Īnything less than 1/4″ above the point is going to result is losing your points when sewing in your blocks. You can see that it’s pretty wonky and a trimming will easily make it perfect! Let’s start off with an untrimmed flying geese block: I’ll get to why it’s my favorite a little further down in this post.

I absolutely love it (yes, it’s what I call a splurge but it’s worth the investment if you make a lot of quilts with flying geese). To the right is a flying geese ruler and is what I’m partial to. Any ruler will do as long as it’s got grid markings every 1/4″. To the left is a basic Omnigrid ruler…I like this one because it’s affordable easy to read. For trimming oversized flying geese, I recommend that you get one of the two rulers shown below: Like I said at the top of this post, there are multiple ways to trim flying geese and these two ways are the easiest for me.

Creative grids flying geese ruler