Summer on Black

Because the weather has been so depressing lately, I decided to work on a quick, small project to brighten the studio.   I've also been interested in playing with some flower appliques, so I put the two together and came up with this little flower garden that fits perfectly above my inspiration board, which is above the Accuquilt Studio cutter.

I used the cutter to cut the leaves and some of the flower petals.  To help reduce some of the scraps that are starting to pile up, I focused on using as many of the solids as possible.  In fact, some of the petals were already cut and left over from previous projects.

All of the birds were also cut on the Studio or pulled from the drawer right below it.  Because I wanted a happy little wall hanging, I tossed on lots of birds.

The wall hanging is long from side to side, but only about 14 or so inches tall.  I put stems on most of the flowers but since this was supposed to be a fun project, I refused to stick to any rules.  

Then came the quilting...lots of fun echo quilting.  While I quilted, I noticed a few applique pieces wanting to peel up.  Arugh, what aggravation! But when we're having fun, we may as well have lots of fun.  So I added some thread painting, a few fancy stitches, and some zigzag when I got tired to finish it off.  

How about this stitching to make two photos one?  I'm sure there's an easier way, but Picasa 3 was fairly easy, as far as pictures go anyway.
Happy Quilting,
Mary