Quilt 11: "Trees" - Assembling the Leaf Blocks

Quilt 11 is my own design - inspired by the majestic gum trees around our house. I have to be careful to explain, however, that my design shows American (or European) trees. Gum trees don't have leaves like the one in my quilt. Eventually, I'll do a tree quilt using a more accurate leaf (it will probably have to be applique'd), but that's a future project. For now, here's what I'm working on.

I bought the fabric - oh - AGES ago, and it's been sitting in my UFO closet until relatively recently. When I realized that I was coming to the end of the "Forbidden Palace" quilt, I knew I needed to get busy and prepare another project so that I don't end up without anything to quilt.

So away we go. I've already assembled the blocks for the tree-trunks, and now am ready to assemble some of the leaf blocks which will represent the branches of the trees.

Here are some of the pieces for one leaf block, partially assembled:



The leaf blocks need a "stem" (lower left corner). After cutting out and assembling the trunks, I had some dark brown strips which will serve well. I've cut them into lengths and pressed the edges under:



Now to position the strip on the sky-blue block that will go in the lower left corner of my leaf block and stitch it down. If you click the image below, a larger version will appear and you'll be able to see the stitching (in black thread) which holds the strip on the blue background.



And below I've stitched the upper 2 strips and positioned the lower strip, ready to stitch it together:



Done!



That's one down, 17 still to go (for the tree branches). There'll be other leaf blocks later, using various fabrics, for the undergrowth beneath the trees.