My First Round Robin Post #7

I received the fourth and final block from my first Crazy Quilting International Round Robin on October 29th.  Unfortunately, I knew November was going to be insanely crazy.  (I participated in NaNoWriMo 2012 - and actually completed the challenge this year!  I will save that for another post...)  My hopes of completing my final block between October 15th and 30th did not quite pan out.  With life being, well, life and the holidays and everything else, we were all running a bit behind; so, no one has been held up by my delay.

In my opinion, the block is absolutely lovely.  Crystal, Hazel and Mardeen did beautiful work on this gorgeous jewel toned block.  This is how it looked when it reached my home.  (Click on the photo to view a larger image.)

Shannon's block after Crystal, Hazel and Mardeen

I am not sure how many days I sat and stared at the block, trying to figure out what to do and where.  This block was a great challenge for me.  I find printed fabrics particularly difficult to embellish, and three of the four spaces remaining were prints.  I also spent hours and hours perusing photos of other crazy quilted blocks to see how I should embellish seams partially covered with other embellishments. 

I began working in the lower green corner.  Originally, I planned to put in a seam of flowers, but they would have been upside down.  So, I opted to put in a gold spider web.  I purchased the perfect blue faceted beads to make the spider.  Unfortunately, he did not show up on the green fabric, so I took him out and used orange beads (similar in color to the orange in the upper printed section.)

Next, I added two Swarovski crystal butterfly beads.  I put one next to a curly golden swirl near the top.  The second went in the black section near the bottom (beneath the blue flower) and I added a golden flight path for him.

Then I moved on to the center section and couched gold metallic floss around the golden edges on the blue flower.  This took some time, but I loved the end result! 

Lower-right section

Once more, I found myself at a loss as to what I would do next.  I decided to move to the seam in the lower-right corner.  I wanted to use colors and shapes already used within the block.  I used a green pearl 8 cotton floss to make an open cretan stitch.  This provided me with stems along the printed fabric and the pink fabric.  Next, I imitated the blue and yellow flower in printed fabric near the center of the top of the block.  The flowers in the pink fabric were made with a yellow center and metallic blue petals.  The flowers in the printed section were made with blue and yellow pearl 8 cotton. 

Center Flower  (The pretty beads were here when I received the block.)

Imitating the center flower, in the dark part of the lower printed fabric, I added a blue bullion flower with bright pink beads in the center and green leaves.

It took me quite a while to figure out how to finish framing the center section of the block.  In the end, I used a fly stitch to create seams along the top section.  On the printed fabric, I made pink flowers (matching the shade of fabric in the lower-left corner of the block) with colonial knots and straight stitches.  In the pink section, I used purple floss.  The flowers on the shorter stems were the same as the pink flowers below.  For the taller flowers, I used lazy daisy stitches in place of the straight stitches, but still used a colonial knot for the center of each flower.  Leaves were added to the stems of the taller flowers.

To the right of the center piece, I made my first feathered chain stitch with a green rayon floss.  This created a vine of leaves.  Using a pink rayon floss and lazy daisy stitches, I added flowers between the leaves on the black fabric.

Shannon's block after Crystal, Hazel, Mardeen and Renee.

My final additions were the purple metallic butterfly and the blue pearl 8 cotton butterfly in the printed fabric at the top of the block.  A golden flight path helped embellish that top seam, as well.

I wish you all a wonderful day!
-Renee