CQJP 2015 - June's Block {completed - finally! - in October}

A few days off.  Time to start stitching again.  This block, for my June entry in CQJP, has taken months.  It has seen a wedding, a couple of trips, and the passing of Mollie Kitty and now the first rains of autumn.  I'm glad it's done at last and hope for less eventful times for the remaining 6 blocks. 

A look at the completed block.

As with most blocks, this one started with rickrack and grew as it would from there. The rick rack in this case was bright yellow, to liven what seemed a somewhat dull block. It did the trick and motivated the rest of the block!

This block had lots of yellow and paler colors on it, so I knew it was going to need livened up by some other colors.  A bit of blue and green in this corner 

Next up was this flower filled patch.


A patch filled with chainstitches clamshells added some brighter orange.

The last seam stitched was this simple feather stitch with yellow flower beads from Florilegium, which were gathered at the CQI retreat in August.  I didn't think I'd use 20 flowers on one seam, but had anticipated using them in floral motifs on several blocks.  But this seam begged for their use.  I was three beads short, but made do.  

A curly vine with buttonhole leaves and flowers.  Love how the flowers turned out!


A curvy featherstitched vine with leaves and bead flowers.


A herringbone seam to fill another corner and spires of french knot flowers.


A thistle like seam adds life to another corner and brings a bit of purple into the block.


Usually I do the central motif fairly early in the block, but on this one, it didn't happen until nearly the end.  Mokuba ribbon flowers as well as a large silk ribbon embroidered blossom creates this motif.


The bright pink of this motif helps to balance the block.

Time to move on to July's block!  I'd really like to be able to finish this project by the end of December, so must stitch MUCH faster than I have been!