"Vine" Little Gem

I'm really enjoying using tinfoil for Little Gems. This old bit of handmade felt will make some leaves - Here they are on top of the quilt sandwich (backing, wadding, tinfoil), under a bit of a repurposed nylon scarf. I've sewn round the edges of the leaves, and they make a satisfying bulge. The long threads are dealt with after all the leaves are sewn down, rather than dealing with the thread after each separate leaf is done.

I sewed the stem with the presser foot, rather than the free-motion foot, but you can see where the pressure of the foot made "tracks" in the tinfoil. Lesson: use the freemotion foot throughout.

What to do in the background? How about some "shadow vines" - here some cords are used to determine the layout, and some of the leaf templates put in place to get an idea of what it will look like - I used a blunt needle to lightly indicate the vine and leaf outlines, and just stitched until the line needed to stop - in which case it was sometimes possible to carefully go along some previous stitching, rather than have to stop and cut the thread -

Next, take the thread out of the needle and stitch all over the background, between the shadow leaves and vines - this will puncture the tinfoil, but as it's behind the sheer layer, it'll all stay in place.

With all the stitching done, it was time to trim to size and apply the binding. I stitched round an A4 piece of paper, then again just inside that line, using pale thread for invisibility, and trimmed along the outer line of stitching. (The stitching helps keep the foil from ripping, if you use a rotary cutter.)

For the binding I used 1.5" slices of net, folded, sewn first to the back of the quilt, right near the quilt edge. Note that the folded edge of the binding is to the outside of the quilt - On the front, fold the binding over as far as it will go, and stitch close to the folded edge of the net.

Do the sides first, then the top and bottom. Et voila! -