The Magical Tree in Progress

I have two boys at home busy gaming with their dad, and one little girl sleeping with a fever.  So today was pretty quiet and laid back for me.  I got to work on Mandy's wall hanging a bit more.  I'm only going to show you snippits though.  : )  First, I made the stars from the booties.  Remember these booties?

 
I put fusible interfacing on the back of the fabrics and drew out the star shape as a guide on the back.

I've seen her boys once, and they were good sized husky guys... so no wimpy stars for them!  ; )  I could tell the woven fabric would unravel, so I stitched inside the shape with a teeny stitch just to hold the edges from fraying.  The "good" thread is in the bobbin sine I'm sewing upside down..

 I'm glad I did that.  There's not much there to work with and I wouldn't want it falling apart.  So I flipped it over and snipped it out, and TA-DA!

Sweet.  I made the second one, which turned out a tad smaller.  That's fine.  The boys are different sizes too.  Mandy really wants me to use more of the stretchy beige Kangaroo wrap, so I sat back and had to think fast.  What do I do?  I took a break from it and a great solution came into my head.  I'm cutting out a circle and adding some sheer sparkle to be the sun.  Mom is the silk floral mei-tei moon.  This sun will represent Dad.  Can you see the sparkle?

The beige tree is done with trapunto and the bark lines are all quilted on.  I'm going to outline the tree with these metallic ribbon/threads I got from Molly.  It looks so sharp against that hot pink & orange sunset.  But check out the mangled mess!

Did you know that you can press ribbons and sheers with a low iron?  So I spent some time ironing meters of teeny ribbons, not too hot or it will melt!

Much better!  And the last thing I want to show you are the dozens of leaves I made for this commission.  I had the dark green and the bright batik, and thought this would be a great spot to add the pale green from that stretchy wrap.  So I fused a couple strips of each fabric to buckrum.  (Buckrum is that stiff canvas used in hat making.)  Then I drew the leaf shape onto the back with a pencil and cut them all out.  After that, I need a new pair of scissors!  Gosh that stuff is so tough that my fabric scissors are shot.  Note to self: use paper scissors next time.  It was worth it because I think these are going to look so pretty stitched on!  I might even fold them and bead on them a bit.  Eek!  I can't wait!

 

And here's the pile of blankies - new and old - that are jumbled in a heap where my daughter slept.  There's just something about loved quilts and sleepy sick kids...  awe...  I hope she feels better soon.

 ~Monika
two hats, three aprons.