MarJen for Error - new quilt block #1

I've been doodling in fabric and thread and have come up with, I think, a color combination for the new embroidered quilt I am working on. I've decided to use the Passion for Pansies collection in some of the yellow and purple shades. The colors really blend well together and create a stunning effect.

This is the floral design that is in the center of 8 of the blocks. I stitched a couple before I came up with the right colors that fit well together.

As always, it is hard to see the full effect of the stitches on a computer screen, but here is a closer view of the stitches. The design stitched out very well, better actually than I anticipated. The designer and digitizer, Jenny Haskins, did a great job digitizing this collection from what I have stitched out so far. It has some shading on the flower, which really adds to the detail in the design. I basically used three colors of purple several times and like the results.

This is the block I have been playing with, trying to decide what to do with the fans that are in the corners. The embroidered design is in the center and then there are 4 cut fans from the purple fabric in each corner. I sewed the 4 fan pieces together and then fused them to the fabric with wonderunder.

You can see I've been playing with different decorative stitches and thread colors to see what looks the best on the fabric. The decorative stitch needs to be one that will curve easily around the top of the fan. It is a fairly sharp curve as you are stitching, so that eliminates several stitches.



I also tried fussy cutting the purple fans on three of the corners and then did not duffy cut the upper left corner. You can see the difference and the fussy cutting really helps to enhance the fabric, but it doesn't look terrible if the fans aren't fussy cut either.



This is one of the corner fans where the fabric is fussy cut:

This is the corner fan where I did not fussy cut the fabric:

I was at a stumbling block, so I consulted a friend for a second opinion and here is the block with the correct colors in the center embroidery design and fussy cut fans. It doesn't have the bright yellow centers in the fans yet or decoratives around the fans, but the block itself is figured out!