Almost Perfect Circles tutorial

The center medallion block for the Sew Intertwined quilt along is a Dresden plate, and of course it has that pretty circle in the middle of it.  Easy peasy right?  Well for some of us it is pretty simple.  We drag out our Go circle die and cutter or our olfa circle cutter and go to town, but what about those who do not have either of those fun little toys?

Well, this tutorial is just for you!

To start you will need 2 pieces of fabric larger than you want your center circle to be.

Place them wrong sides together (I chose a solid for my second piece since it will not be seen), place a pin in the center to hold them together.

Find a round object the same size you want your finished circle to be.   The nice thing about Dresden's is there is no law on how big your center circle should be.

Now place your round object on your fabric and trace around it with a pencil.

Take your fabric to your sewing machine and slowly stitch along your line.  You will most likely need to raise your presser foot and slightly turn your fabric every 2-3 stitches to stay on your line.

Once you are done trim your fabric to about 1/4" of your seam.

Now, take and make little slits in your seam allowance being careful not to cut through your stitching.

Finally, make a cut in the backing fabric of your circle so that you can turn it right side out.  You can see the slits I cut a little better in this picture.

 Use a blunt object to push your seams out making it nice and round.  I used a pen cap to push my seams out.

 Now press, and applique to the center of your Dresden Plate.

You can use your machines fancy stitches for this or just the basic straight stitch.