I guess I have done it the hard way (but the way I loved). I bought an acyrlic ruler (hexagon shape), traced around the size I wanted and put my dots on where to start and stop stitching and cut the pieces. I have hand pieced all my flowers and now I'm ready to cut the white pieces to set it up. I don't do the English paper piecing, just stitched a regular 1/4 inch seam, starting and stopping 1/4 in from each end and doing the "Y" seams most people seem to hate. I don't mind them at all. Other things I machine stitch, but this has given me great satisfaction hand piecing it.