My May Stitch Along Week 2
Oh man, did I have a lot of fun with my flower stitch along this weekend. This could get really addictive! I even tried out something new. A technique that I refer to as back to front applique. You see, instead of fusing the back of the fabric to cut it out, I made a sandwich of backing, batting and fusible webbing - in that order so the fusible was on top. Then I cut pieces of green fabric and lay them on top of the fusible, making sure it was all covered before pressing it in place. It worked a charm!
With my background built up, not stitched yet - that will come later, I began thinking about the flower. I printed out my flower photo and placed it on the light-box, then covered it with my lightest pink fabric instead of fusible which is what I would normally do.
I drew the outline of the flower as a guide directly on the fabric.
With the outline drawn, now I used my paintstiks to darken the center. Red, white and navy was used and then I used the blender stick to mix them through. 
Time to cut it out now...
... and audition it on the background.
My thoughts are to soften the background a little so I pulled out a couple of sheer fabrics to see how they looked. The first was white and the second was wide stripes of orange and blue. I really liked the change in color so I picked the latter.
Now time for the fun part! The stitching - my favorite free-motion. I will use 3 shades of pink thread for the flower.
Usually I start in the center and work out, but this time, I decided to start with the light pink. You can see I stitched around the edge first, then added more stitching within the petal shape.
I think that's enough stitching for the light thread...
... let's add the darkest pink next in the center.
... and then the middle shade of pink to blend it all.
I am liking the effects so time to move on to selecting green threads - again I chose three.
.... and started stitching with the lightest thread on the lightest green fabrics. No need to blend these greens together.
How's it looking?
I finished off with the darkest green, then outlined the entire flower with the medium pink thread and added a stamen with a little light pink stitching and gold beads. I also trimmed the block. It ended up 8" square.
As a finishing touch, I found this bee to add to the corner.
Can you tell, I had a lot of fun? I'm almost tempted to make another. But I need something else for next week so let's see what I can come up with then.
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