Funky Froggy Flowers

The final challenge for this season's Project Quilting was "Large".  We had to use at least a quarter yard of a large scale print.  We also had to use at least one stripe or plaid. 

I had some large scale colorful frog print squares that equalled somewhere between a quarter yard and a half yard.   I chose one subtle stripe fabric and one stipe fabric that was just a little bolder.

Though I like the frog fabric, I didn't want my piece to be all about frogs.  I really wanted to  play with textures and that helped to disguise the frogs a bit but still let the colors shine.  I made three different kinds of flowers. 

One had petals that became very textured and bumpy through the use of Texture Magic and batting.  

Another flower had petals with batting and straight line quilting.  All of these petals were appliqued to the background with a zig-zag stitch. 

The three smaller flowers are circles of fabric each gathered around a circle of very stiff stabilizer that's just a little too big.  Gathering tightly caused the stabilizer circle to bow and bend a little, adding an extra element of texture to the gathers and keeping the flowers from laying flat on the background.  Yellow buttons are in the middle of the flowers.  
Several shades of green embroidery floss were braided together for the stems of the larger flowers.

Using the subtle stiped fabric I sewed a few dozen pleats very close together.  I cut a vase shape and sewed the pleats down along the edge of the vase.  Down the center of the vase I pushed the pleats in the opposite direction and again sewed them down.  This gave another element of texture and also formed a new look to the stripes.  Sewing the pleats was much harder than I anticipated but I love the look.

The piece was quilted with slightly curvy diagonal lines and bound with the brighter stripe fabric.  I thought I'd cut the binding on the bias but after the diagonal quilting decided to go with straight stripes.

The judges have a few good suggestions on how this could have been better... I might not be finished with it.

You can see the rest of the entries at Kim's Crafty Apple and at the Project Quilting with KimsCraftyApple flickr group.

The season had ended.  It was fun to see all the different interpretations of the challenges.  I loved having the challenge to make new projects and the judge's critiques were so helpful.  They gave great tips for improving and I seldom disagreed with anything they said.  I would find myself looking at my works-in-progress in different ways.  We all help out each other on our blogs but I think we tend to only make supportive comments.  The Project Quilting judges were anonymous - that may have made it a little easier to offer constructive critism.  Thank you to all the judges for your time and advice!

And thanks, Kim, for another great season!