Sunday, March 4, 2012

SBS BOW - Fool's Puzzle

The block I chose to do this week, Fool's Puzzle, is a Drunkard's Path variation. I generally don't mind sewing curves, when they're large, gentle curves. But, these units finish at 1-1/2 inches and I didn't relish doing 16 of them. So, I decided that I'd try a technique I once saw in a book. I appliqued circles to squares, and cut them into quarters. 


This isn't the final arrangement. I forgot to take that picture, but it looks great, right? Well, look what happened when those units were sewn together.



Not so great. This technique might work for larger circles and squares, but at this size it's very noticeable that the arcs are kind of flat and the circle shape is lost. So I thought. And thought. And thought some more and just before falling asleep a couple of nights ago it came to me. Remarkably I still remembered my "bright idea" the next morning AND it seemed to make sense. I made a template and appliqued the shapes to the squares and cut them into quarters. 



They look a little wonky, don't they? But, here's what they look like sewn together:


I'd say this is a definite improvement. 

(Sorry about the different lighting in the pictures. The completed blocks were scanned whereas the intermediary steps were done with the camera.)

2 comments:

  1. Yvonne you are so bright Olive

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  2. Thanks Olive! The time I spent figuring that out - I could have pieced the units the traditional way either by hand or machine! But, now I can do it anytime and for any size.

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