A Large Handwork Project

One day while at a friend's house, several of us were sitting around the table doing some hand sewing.  One woman was looking through a "Fons and Porter" magazine (Sept/Oct 2014) and turned to the page with this quilt.

It immediately caught my eye because it is so colorful.  I really liked it.  My friend gave me the magazine--so nice of her!  And I proceeded to check out this pattern.

It is designed by Susan McDermott.  The magazine said that she made the quilt using hand appliqué, but they were giving the directions for how to make it by machine.  It just so happened that I was looking for a new hand-sewing project to carry around with me to quilting-friend get-togethers.  So I started in on it.

The pattern supplied templates, which I copied onto cardboard (for drawing on the fabric and cutting out the circles) and template plastic (for ironing the edges under).  There are actually four different sizes of squares in this quilt.  The circles are appliquéd on to the squares, then the blocks are cut into four pieces and re-pieced together.  I will do all of that work by machine, you can be sure!

Here is what my workload looks like.  I need 187 of the larger blocks and 33 of the smaller ones.  That's quite a few, but I've already gotten a fair number of them sewn up.  All of the small 4" square-circles are done, and quite a few of the larger ones are, too.

And the best part is that they are totally made from my scraps!  Not that it seems to have made much of a dent, but it's a start.

The block above shows a circle pinned to a square.  I iron the squares into quarters so I know where the center of each side is.  The circles have lines marked on them, too, so I know exactly where to place them.

After the circles are appliquéd on, I cut out the excess background fabric behind the circles in order to reduce the bulk.  The photo above shows this, although it's a little hard to see.

And here is the the same square seen from the front. 

I will be sure to keep you updated on the progress of this quilt.