steelecg,
Having completed over half the Farmer's Wife Sampler blocks, using Marti Michel templates and not the ones in the book, I can say I am not having any troubles. The templates are expensive, but then quilting is not a cheap hobby. I had them from a prior project. Try a few blocks and see if you like it. If I could figure out how to do so, I would post a few blocks
here somewhere.
Su H. in Vancouver USA