Getting There on County Fair

I'm making slow but steady progress on the Debbie Mumm County Fair quilt.  The beehives block took awhile.  There are elements of both piecing and applique. 

For the bee skeps (beehives), you cut graduated sizes of rectangles in two different fabrics, then you round off the ends.  The instructions said to cut two identical fabric pieces, sew them together, then slit one of the pieces so you can turn it right side out, and press flat.  

Well, forget that!  That would make every appliqued piece double-thickness, plus the background it's sewn down onto, for a total of three layers of cotton fabric.  Nope, nope, nope.  Not gonna do it.

When I made my appliqued circles quilt in 2016, I sewed each circle to a very thin non-fusible interfacing type material and then turned and pressed it.  That sheer layer is easy to turn and everything lies nice and flat, no excess bulk to stitch through. 

So that's the method I used for these bee skep pieces.  The above picture shows the process from left to right:  Stitch a fabric rectangle to a piece of the lightweight stuff, trim seams, slit the sheer layer, turn and press.

Repeat 23 more times.

Later in the instructions, you're told to use fusible web for each of the black circles and bee wings.  Honest to Pete, I thought, the whole works could've been fused!  Ah well, live and learn.

So there was a lot of fiddling around on this block, but I really like how cute it turned out!

Here are the blocks I've completed so far on the design wall.  This is not how the quilt goes together; I just needed somewhere to put them for the time being.

Now I'm on to the final four large pieces (each one looks like a partial block; it'll all come together in the final layout).  Here is the first one of the four.  This. Took. Forever.

But the end is in sight!  The big blocks with blue backgrounds need to have corner triangles sewn on, and then the whole works gets sewn together.  

If all goes to plan, I should have a completed quilt top by the end of the weekend!