Paper Pieced Pilots Wheel

QuiltPro to the rescue again, a mix of Dresden Plate and Mariners compass blocks plus some folded squares to finish off. I was quite impressed with myself.

This has potential but looks too messy and too complicated, I like the octagonal effect,Can you spot the mistake? I needed to simplify this further

Much simpler and cleaner but it needs more variety in the fabric which is where the layer cake comes in useful, lots of variety. The Day Sail line must have been very popular because I have never found much of it even online! Whenever I see it I buy it but I will probably need to add in more solids (Bella Betty's Red and Bella Aqua), some of Bonnie & Camilles recent range, Vintage Picnic and some other fabrics ... the ship's dog?

Kona Snow will be the  background although I was tempted by an aqua background


I thought I would paper piece the block

I usually paper piece on newsprint  (Blick All Purpose Newsprint) because it is cheap, you can almost see the lines from the back and it tears very easily.
I precut the fabric over size  but because I was using Kona Snow as the background I really needed to press away from the white so I decided that I didn't need to paper piece if I could stick a trimming template onto my ruler to cut the wedges.

I stuck it onto the Companion Angle and was able to get very accurate patches which were as good as the paper pieced version. I learned this trick from a brilliant book from years ago when rulers and rotary cutters were just becoming available. I need to find the book. It was where I first learned about the magic 7/8s and 1 1/4 and my quilting life changed forever.  I am starting to get excited about this quilt!