Opinions please!

Sorry can't help with the quilting ideas, Estelle; but I did want to say how pretty it is. The flowers are gorgeous - exactly the colour!

I didn't understand the reference to Kathyl! but those postcards are just superb. There were lots I haven't seen before (I should check more often!). You are so very good at those - honestly. . In message , Estelle Gallagher writes

Hi Estelle, That is truly beautiful.

If it was me, I think I would do some stippling but not close together and not over the flowers - sort of just rambling around them. Does that make sense.

Such a wonderful composition, Estelle, I enjoyed all the fine details of the stems and tendrils. You did ask for opinions and I'm kind of hesitant to slip in a suggestion - purely from an artist's point of view - but here she comes. You have some of your Glories facing the viewer and some turned up. That's good. Now I would like for you to put an appliqué on at least one of the green leaves to make it appear that an edge has folded in to the top surface of the leaf. It would add some motion. It's been a long time since I've painted flowers - but since they are not in a formal vase setting, you would assume that a gentle breeze could stir them just a little. Taking our in-progress paintings to the gallery for opinions was always big fun to me - some suggestions were immediately tossed out, of course, but sometimes another point of view was like a light coming on. I hope you'll think about mine. Polly

I agree with Di. The only difference is that I would do a little quilting in the flowers and leaves. Perhaps just enough to define flower petals and veins in the leaves. Otherwise, they're just going to puff up. I find that freehand work needs a good amount of quilting since it isn't flat and square to begin with. For the rest of the center, just a medium to small stipple with clear invisible thread. Since it has a garden theme, I'd use the letter "e" type stippling (like your tendrils) since the texture will look a bit like leaves and tendrils. Then I'd do a larger stipple around the outer border perhaps outlining/accent some of the color variations in the batik. I might even try a thread the color of your trellis for that to pull the eye back to the center of the quilt. I'd bind it with the same fabric as the outer border.

Just my > Hi Estelle,

here's an idea. Assuming you're machine quilting? I'd do a dense stipple on the background, really flattening the farthest away visual element with a matching but dark to medium in value, variegate thread to mimic nature's backround. Then I get a lighter value, variegated thread to match the trellis and free motion quilt it in lines to sort of mimic the grain of wood. I would add a tiny bit of extra batting behind some of the nearest flowers and/or leaves, and begin by outlining the flowers and leaves with matching(in both value and color) thread. I would then either leave the flowers and leave fluffy, or I'd do something along the lines of what Polly suggested and find ways, either with paint, thread, beads, or fabric, to highlight the parts of the picture that have sun shining on them, and darken those parts in shadow.

Musicmaker

Without reading other opinions, here's mine:

1. Outline all the existing leaves, flowes and vine, then quilt more of everything, extending all the way out to the border, so on the back it looks entirely covered in quilted leaves, flowers and vine.
2. Use regular batting.
3. Invisible thread IMO is the way to go here, unless you can find a variegated that looks just like the background fabric. Which is extremely lovely, BTW.

Thanks for the view! Roberta >I have been creating a W H . Its a trellis done in the Rick Timms style( no

Without reading other replies and ideas: I would first use some rayon thread to define petal dimensions and leaf veining. Ghost quilt more leaves in the background to extend the image into the borders - then use some echo quilting to give some movement to the leaves and flowers

- the tendrils could be the beg> I have been creating a W H . Its a trellis done in the Rick Timms style( = no

I love this design and the fabric choices are perfect. I don't have any idea about batting. I sometimes use more batting in one place or another rather than the whole piece for effect. Not quite tarpunto but .... lazy girl's tarpunto maybe. :P

As for quilting, I might be tempted to use a gorgeous variegated thread pulling in the color of the morning glories. How? Well I generally use a machine. But that's not the answer you're looking for. I'm not the best quilter or most experienced. They will be along later and may be able to get into specifics with you. In the meantime, I really, really like this and wish I had it hanging on that empty space where the Christmas Advent piece just came down.

Sunny

Wow, we're all here at once. When I started writing my reply, I was third. By the time I finished, I was 16! LOL -- and the real quilters did show up and you got just incredible information and suggestions.

Hugs, Sunny

To build on Polly's idea, having that leaf slightly overlap the small inner border would add a lot of dimension as well. ~:o)

Polly Esther wrote: