SophieHatter

I am possibly a) mad, b) slapdash, and c) patient, but I find hand sewing very relaxing and machine sewing very stressful, and I can't be doing with all those bits of paper. So I just make a pair of templates - a bigger one to cut round and a smaller one to sew round - or one doughnut shaped one for both, out of some very solid cardboard using a stanly knife or some very sharp scissors to cut it out straight. Then I iron the fabric and lay it nice and flat-but-relaxed on the table, and draw the shapes directly onto the back of the fabric with a softish art pencil, taking care to keep it at a consistent angle rather than digging into the cardboard or the fabric. I cut out my shapes, then just sew backstitch along the lines! I pin the pieces in place as I go along, so adding the patches as I get to them when I am sewing, poking the pins through the corners carefully first and pointing these diagonally outwards so they don't slide, then putting a couple of pins in straight along the line that I am about to sew. I made a hexagonal quilt for my Gran that way, and it worked beautifully. It's kinda wonky if you actually get your ruler and protractor out, but that's part of the charm and it doesn't show! I've just finished sewing the front of a standard square patchwork quilt that way, I've yet to quilt it but it looks good so far.

Probably not your normal recommended style of expert quilting, but it keeps me happy!
And because there's no sewing machine to lug around and no clickety noise, and I can control it with my fingertips without consciously concentrating, I can sew on the train, while listening to podcasts, in the garden, on holiday, while chatting to talkative relatives... so it's not like the extra time it takes is wasted!