The Lichen Tree

 It's finished -- The Lichen Tree!!

There it goes, sailing around in the breeze while I try to get some daylight photos.

The breeze finally dropped and the clothes line quit spinning.

I finished the quilting last week. 

It's mostly wavy vertical lines with a few details here and there.

I was inspired by a recent design that Lori at The Inbox Jaunt shared to create these "water droplets" here and there throughout the background fabric.

In the tree trunk, I created some knot holes and scars in the bark.

I was delighted to find a color of Aurifil (#4653) to create patches of lichen along the snow plastered side of the tree trunk.

The backing fabric was in my stash of classic "landscape" prints -- nice to have it handy and nice to be able to use it!! I faced the edges rather than binding them -- not sure I enjoyed doing that but I like the finished look.  I guess I just didn't feel confident about the outcome.

Do you see what happened to the top edge?

The trunk of the tree breaks through the top edge of the quilt -- happy improvisational result!!

Edit -- 6/2/2017 -- I entered the piece in the annual Fairmount Center Art Exhibition in Novelty, Ohio and much to my great surprise and delight, the quilt won first in the fiber category of the show (and a nice cash prize to go with it)!  Wahoo!!!

You can revisit my post about piecing this quilt top HERE.

This is perhaps the fifth non-traditional piece I've created over the past 20 years -- I'm never quite sure where they come from but I've enjoyed discovering each one!!

Linking up to the second quarter sharing over at 2017 Finish-A-Long HERE.

Mary

**A lichen is a composite organism -- algae living among filaments of a fungus in a symbiotic relationship. The combination gives lichen properties that are very different from the properties algae or fungus.  Lichens come in many colors, sizes, and forms but they are not plants.