Flying Geese

Flying Geese are always an excellent way to use up scraps. There are a number of different ways of making them, including my favourite if I have larger piecs of fabric, the no-waste flying geese method.  However, if you have smaller rectangle that you want to get rid of, you can always make geese individually.  

Bordered Squares

This block is very simple - just a square, bordered by the same fabric all the way around. In this instance, I did half the blocks with the odd white-looking fabric as the centre and half with the coloured fabrics. Or that was the intention. As it happened, I counted wrong, and ended up with 16 and 14, which meant that arranging them took a little creativity. But I often use this square in a border block for scrap quilts - it's simple, yet effective.

Here's another use of essentially the same block, only in this instance, the centre of the square is much larger to start with, so it makes more of a feature of the centre.

Scrappy blocks

This is a variation on my standard go-to for scraps. I made some crumb blocks (stitching scraps together more or less randomly and then trimming square) and created four patches using the crumbs and a solid (i.e. only one fabric) square.  Then, I used some strips to border them until they got the size I wanted - in this case, 12", but you could use any size you wanted.   I like this sort of effect, because it's scrappy, but at the same time, having some larger pieces incorporated makes it easier on the eye. Also, you can use all sizes and shapes of scraps in a setting like this.

When I made these blocks, I blogged the process; you can see that here.

Irish Chain

Always a classic way of using small scraps - you can make the nine patches with any size square - in this instance, they were 2.5" squares, I think, leftover from using a layer cake of fabric for something else.  The chain shows particularly well when set in a very simple, even solid colour background, but can work with other fabrics, as long as they aren't too busy.

Granny Squares

This one is a classic, and has been making the rounds in blogland a bit this past year - the Granny Square. You can do this with any size square; I think mine were 2.5", but I could be wrong. A good way for using up scrap squares.  When I made these blocks, I pretty much winged it, but here's a tutorial for a "no-waste" version.

Scrappy Stars

Another great way to use up scrappy square. Again, you can use any size square you might happen to have on hand - you will just need to work out how big a smaller, neutral square to use, depending on what size larger square you have used. Each star block takes 8 squares of background fabric and 1 square of star fabric in the larger size and then 8 small squares of star fabric.

Funky Four Patch

This is a quick and easy way to add a little life into the more traditional four patch block.  I like this method for using up scraps, when you have a decent size piece of neutral or background fabric to use with them.  Amazingly, when I made this top in a different colourway, I actually took step-by-step photos (more or less) with a view to writing a mini-tutorial, but never wrote one, so here it is now...

Choose your fabrics. As I said, I like this best with a neutral/background fabric and then a selection of contrasting fabrics. But you could do it in just two fabrics, if you wanted to!

Cut an equal number of squares of the background and the contrast fabrics. You will get two blocks from each pair of squares, so for a quilt like the green and blue one above, you only need 12 of each; for the purple and neutral one, you need 18 of each.  The size of the square doesn't really matter, but remember that you will lose a bit from cutting and recutting and possibly from trimming at the end. I probably started with a square that was around 7". And probably ended up at 5.5" or so.

So. To make the blocks, you take two squares - one background, one contrast and stack them together, right sides up.

Then, using your cutter and ruler, make a cut across both pieces of fabric at whatever angle you fancy (but not too extreme - moderation works best).

You now have 4 pieces of fabric - two pairs, where the colours are reversed. You need to stitch them together back into squares, one with a purple left side and neutral right side and one the other way around.

Once that's done, stack them back together, again, right sides up.

Oops, no photo of this process, but what you do is slice across both squares the other direction and once again, take the left side of the top square and stitch it to the right side of the bottom square. And vice-versa.  Which gives you this:

(Different fabrics, I know, but same effect).  Easy as pie!

Scrappy triangles

This is a good design for using up a variety of different sized scraps - the basic HST unit blocks could be made to fit almost any size triangle (or square) which you have knocking about. What I did here, which I really like the effect of, was two things:  first, I grouped my scrappy HSTs by colour to make it look more unified and second, I used an alternating block with a larger HST unit to give the eye somewhere to rest and to use up a piece of slightly awkward fabric I had hanging about anyway. I like this design a lot - may even use it again.