I’ve decided the time has now come to try paper piecing, because the results on other people’s work looks brilliant, and there are fabrics I have that I’m visualising as being used for that sort of design. It’s been 18 months or so since I started patchwork, and have never tried this before! I read how to do it in Linda Clements’ The Quilter’s Bible, and saw Texas Quilting’s hint that freezer paper is good to use (https://texasquilting.org/) so got some online while I was buying fabric, as it isn’t something I’ve noticed on sale in British supermarkets. When I first started quilting and was stocking up on what I thought would be essential supplies, I’d bought a template which can be used for making hexagons in different sizes, so used that and a craft knife to cut out the shapes on freezer paper. Took ages to work out how to use the template, with help from husband and the internet! On Thursday evening I’d cut out 7 paper hexagons and the bits of fabric to go round them. It took me the whole of my 40 min train journey to work just to tack 2 and a half pieces (see first picture). But that evening I finished tacking the others, and sewed them together over the course of the weekend, along with all the other things I was doing. The points of one hexagon aren’t right, but otherwise it’s not a bad start and I hope I’ll speed up with practice. I’m not sure what the best technique is, e.g. whether to try to sew three edges with one piece of thread, and it seems difficult to be accurate despite all my efforts. I haven’t taken the paper out because I want to add more and thought it best to leave them in for now. I have no idea what I’ll do with it in the end, but I love the colours so for now will keep adding, as a secondary patchwork project to my main autumn quilt.

I did want to make these images smaller, but seem to have lost how to do that!