The Geese of Gettysburg

Ok, I did go "out of my box" for this week's Project Quilting entry.  The criteria for this challenge was to use a traditional Flying Geese block as inspiration but to do something different with it.  I wanted to try the curved Flying Geese that I've seen in some art quilts at shows, but I'd never made them before, so this attempt was completely different for me.  And while I'm most comfortable with reproductions, home-spuns, and some brighter cottons, I rarely use batiks ~ which I used here to piece the background. 

I wanted the geese to curve and graduate in size, so I figured that paper piecing would be the way to go with this.   I drew out my curves and drafted the geese in a larger "life size" form, and then traced the geese unit in four sections to make them easier to handle. 

Then I paper pieced the geese, and sewed the units together.  

Since my first love is hand applique, that's how I decided to attach my geese to my background.  I basted under the edges, appliqued it in place, and then cut away the background from behind and removed the paper backing from the geese. 

The other criteria of the challenge was to use two complimentary colors on the color wheel in our piece.  I used 13 different shades of blue and orange to compose the flying geese, graduating the shades from dark to light to dark again.  Blue and orange because my inspiration for the project are the geese that converged on my daughter's college campus every year at Gettysburg College ~ and blue and orange are Gettysburg school colors.  After quilting, I stretched and mounted the quilt over a 16" x 20" artist canvas. 

The machine appliqued geese silhouettes in a smoky brown color are to depict the actual geese roaming the campus around my daughter's dorm ~ thus the title of the piece...The Geese of Gettysburg.  Although with that title I feel like it needs a cannon silhouette or something ~ I'm not sure I've ever seen a Gettysburg inspired quilt that wasn't done in Civil War Reproduction fabrics :)

The voting is up now for this week's Project Quilting challenge and you can go here to cast your vote for your favorite entry.  It's really cool to see what everyone comes up with, and to read what their inspirations were.  Don't forget to leave a comment to be entered in the give away too!

Enjoy the day!
~ Dawn