Evening at the Pond – Step by Step Piecing Instructions

This post seems to be jinxed! I wrote the whole post, to find that I had overwritten the assembly instructions. Those will follow in another post!

My laptop is back from the service centre with a new hard disk, but I am not able to locate all the pictures! So here are the step by step instructions for piecing the Evening at the Pond block, ( the second block in the Dreamcatcher Round the Year Block of the Month quilt) with the pictures for a few steps missing.

As you may recall, here also the finished block size is 18″ square with a 15″ inset circle. The block is paper foundation pieced before being assembled. This is a really easy block, though you may find piecing the flying geese a bit tedious! I know that I thought the Dahlia block was super easy to piece, not so easy to assemble. This one is really, really easy to assemble, it has no curves anywhere!

So here we go!

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Take print outs of the template.pdf file with your printer settings at 100% or actual size. Cut out the templates, leaving a little margin on all sides. You have the following templates:

• 8 arc templates numbered I to P for the outer ring of flying geese
• 8 triangular templates A to H for the inner ‘pond’
• Template S in 2 pieces S1 and S2 for one quarter of the outside square.

1. Take a print out of the Instructions File and keep it hand.
2. Colour code the fabric you plan to use. Follow the instructions to cut the fabric. If your fabric is pre-starched, it gives a nice, crisp, neat finish to your final block!
3. Pin the cut fabric pieces to each template
   using the colour code as a guide – I always do that or I get confused what goes where!!

4. 

5. Piecing the Pond

• The templates A, C, E and G are pieced from the outer edge to the centre and the alternate pieces B, D, F and H are pieced from the centre outwards.
• The adjoining seams facing opposite directions ensures a nice `fit’ when the pieces are finally assembled.

• 

• Unpin the two fabric pieces to be joined, place them on the wrong side of the template, keeping a seam allowance of ¼” approximately. The remaining two pieces are pinned back to the template so that they don’t get misplaced and mixed up!
• I chain pieced the templates in alphabetical order, so that my chain looked something like this!

• 

• My fabric pieces are not rectangles like yours will be – this is so that you do not make stupid mistakes like I did! Lesson learnt – Resist the temptation to trim the fabric pieces to size before you sew them!

• 

• Also remember to flip over your piece No 2 to ensure that it covers the entire section that it is supposed to! Or you may end up using the services of Jack the Ripper!

• 

• One way to ensure that is to lightly fold the fabric piece to find the centre and do the same for the paper template, and match them when sewing. ( However, this is unlikely to happen to you, because I have made the pieces really long, with a lot of margin of error!
• Now that all the 8 pond templates have the sections 1 and 2 pieced, we clip apart the templates and head to the ironing table. Trim seam allowance to ¼” if needed. You can just eyeball it and use your scissors to trim the seam – not necessary to use the services of a rotary cutter.
• Press open piece 2; if your fabric is well starched and crisp, you may just finger press.

• 

• Similarly attach piece 3. Trim seam allowance to ¼” and press open the third piece.

• 

• Attach piece 4, trim seam allowance to ¼” press open. Trim the excess fabric from the sides and our pond pieces are ready! That was really easy, wasn’t it?!

• 

Do not get confused by this picture! I changed the pattern after I made this block, so your pond templates will add up to an octagon, not a circle!

1. Piecing the flying geese
2. The templates I to P will be pieced to make a ring of flying geese. Here chain piecing is not really possible, so this bit of piecing goes a bit slow!

• Place the first rectangle for the goose (wrong side of fabric touching paper) so that the seam allowance between Goose 1 and Goose 2 extends about a ¼” beyond the seam line, like in the picture below.

• 

• Place the half square triangle for Piece 2 with the longest side (hypotenuse) aligned to the seam allowance. You can hold it against the light to see that the piece extends approximately ¼” beyond the seam line. You can pin it like I have done. These two pictures show the two sides…

• 

  

• Caution : The next few pictures are of a previous version of the block, so please do not get confused by the template numbers or order of piecing.
  Sew on the seam line, extending your seam line to approximately ¼” beyond into the next section.

• 

• Flip over and trim the excess fabric to leave a seam allowance of ¼” , press open.

• 

• Similarly sew the other triangular `sky’ piece, going beyond the centre point, like was done for the previous piece. Now trim the seam allowance to ¼” and press open. The first goose is ready!

• 

• TIP – Before sewing the sky pieces, do remember to check the placement of the piece so that it covers the respective `sky’ section fully when pressed open. This is especially true of the sky pieces on the outer border of the ring.
  Fold back the paper on the seam line between the just pieced section and the next – that would be the long line of Piece 4. You will need tear a bit of the paper here, to detach the top seam allowance from the paper. No worry!
• Trim this seam allowance to ¼” on the just pieced portion.
• Place the rectangle piece for the second goose, right side down on the just pieced section and sew. Press open. Continue to piece as in previous sections.
• Here is a picture taken by Sobana, who tested the block!

• 

• And here is a picture of the fully pieced template, trimmed to size

• 

• This is how it looks from the back! You can see how the seams extend into the adjoining section in the centre of the template.

• 

• And here is the full ring of flying geese made by Sobana! Aren’t they pretty?

• 

So all our templates are pieced!

Using the master template as a guide, arrange your templates and admire them!

The assembly instructions will be  online soon, while you get cracking on this!

You can download the instructions and templates files here.

1. Paper piecing templates – Evening at the Pond ( Block Two of Round the Year Quilt)

2. Instructions (Dusk version) -Evening at the Pond ( Block Two of Round the Year Quilt)

You can access the pattern for the first block, Dahlia here.

 Please note that the downloadable patterns with paper piecing templates and instruction files for the Dreamcatcher Round the Year quilt blocks are being migrated to my store MadsPatch and will not be available for download for free from 15th November 2020 onwards.

Author: Mads

In alphabetical order: daughter, mother, painter, philosopher, poet, quilter, seeker, wife... View all posts by Mads