Now we’ve come full circle and I’m already back to curved piecing again. Is it too soon, after the storm cloud that was block G5? At least it seems like simpler curved piecing than that cursed block, so I was game to tackle curves again.

But before I could get to the dreaded curved piecing, I needed more fabric. That’s right, folks, I’ve used up another yard of the precious red, and had to slice another yard off the bolt midway through cutting out this block. The quarter circles came from the previous yard, but the rest came from the new yard.

At this point, the Dear Jane software thinks I have used up 8 5/8 yards of the red, but I have in fact used just a smidgeon over three yards. So, I’m feeling good about my chances of having enough red fabric for the quilt.

Once I got all the pieces cut out, I was ready to assemble. I opted to stitch all the quarter circles to their corresponding concave pieces first:

And this time, I made sure to put the concave piece on top when stitching those curves, which made everything go much smoother.

The only real downside to curved piecing on this block is that the pieces are small and my pins are big, so they often extended beyond the edge of the fabric. And there are a lot of pins required to hold curved pieces in place, so I ended up stabbing myself in the palm a lot.

Luckily, I was working on this block over Zoom with retreat friends, and they came to the rescue. Judi brought me a selection of thin appliqué pins so I could try them out before buying (appliqué pins are typically much shorter than regular sewing pins), and Barb suggested Little House appliqué pins, which are about as thin as my favorite Clover Extra-Fine pins (but half an inch shorter). I got some of those Little House pins for Christmas and I can’t wait to try them out!

After stitching those short curved seams, the rest of the block assembly was essentially an easy-peasy nine-patch block:

Overall, I think this block was successful as a way to banish the bad feelings over my recent curved piecing attempt. And now I have new pins to look forward to for my next round of curved piecing (or even appliqué).

The October UFO Challenge results were the usual: one Dear Jane block, two more sashed together (and to the September blocks), plus 18 triangle motifs on the rainbow quilt: