The quilt has 30 blocks, and not a single one didn’t need something. Some were fairly simple, just restitching the ric-rack or mending a small hole, but a few were much more involved.
There is no batting, exactly, in the quilt. Rather, a recycled, lightweight fleece served as both batting and backing. There was also essentially no quilting. Just some stitch-in-the-ditch at the sashing and between the blocks. The blocks themselves are roughly 13″ x 14″. You can guess some of the problems that causes.

This block, and two similar to it, had ruined backgrounds. The birds were in pretty good shape, but…

First, to expose the entire problem, the netting applied as mending needed to be removed.

The fabric that hadn’t already torn was so fragile that saving it with some kind of backing wasn’t an option. I found a near-matching piece of fabric as a new background and cut it around an inch larger than the existing block. Pins mark the position of the bird as it was placed on the block.

I cut the applique bird out of the existing background, leaving some extra around the edges where possible.

I ironed the extra towards the back.

And re-appliqued it onto the new near-matching background.

Now, to fit the block into the hole, which is no longer a true rectangle, or any particular shape. Lots of pins. And blind stitching the edges into the hole.

In the end I believe the new block doesn’t stand out too much as “new.” Hopefully the owner will see the memory of what once was and not be too taken aback by the changes.

One more look at “before” and “after” side by side.
Believable?
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