Leafing Out

The vine is sewn; the cardinals will fit. I only want a few of them but perhaps a bit more upright.

Pinning cardinals and leaves on vine border

I pinned some leaves to check the angles and the spacing. Would some look good directly under the cardinals?

The vine was easy to sew but I'm having more trouble with the leaves. My stitches wobble very far from the edge at times. I try slower speeds {and even the half-speed button} but before too long I'm back in the Grand Prix. Changing to the overlock foot helps a bit {except for my speeding tendencies.} When the wire on the right is positioned along the raw edge, it creates an eighth-inch seam... until I sew too rapidly. "Slow down on curves" is not sinking in.

Attaching leaves by machine applique

Mary at Mary and Patch is machine stitching raw edge applique by sewing around each piece twice. Also, Cathi at Gertrude Made used this same technique to applique her lovely bird. The casual feel of the stitching is very appealing. Too bad some of my leaves are sewn and tied off. I hate thinking about redoing them but dislike even more my current poor technique. At least I found a possible solution before it's quilted.  Gotta love that.

Making haste slowly but I'm still sticking to one project at a time. For now. I will need another Grandmother quilt next month and plan to quilt the red and yellow string top soon.

Red and yellow string quilt top

The green string was quilted with channels, the blue with double row checkerboard. I'm trying to figure out another simple no-marking quilting design to try.

Enjoy the day, Ann