wow! this #3 was a doozey for me!

i was thrilled with the assignment!  thrilled i say......thrilled. 

until i tried working with the space....5 inches finished that was 20 inches long....hhhmmmm....would have made a really cool tall tree, and that was what i wanted to do, but just could not find a good tree that was tall enough yet narrow enough....that five inches was gonna be the death of me.

saw the cute little bird in it's nest from those wonderful gumtree designers new "things we like" BOM.  jenny of elefantz designed the first block....i HAD to put it in....it was stitching afterall....then, i decided on some pine cones....couldn't find any good stitched pinecone pattern either, but DID find a nice little prim paper pieced one. 

i am retarded when it comes to paper piecing....what would have taken 5 minutes for a normal person that can think in reverse (i just can't for paper piecing--can for other things but NOT this!)  took me hours.  really.  to make 2, yes, 2 pinecones.  they are below.

  not completely finished, but still...and, they had used the fabric that i would not use...it is in each cone, on the top one it is the 3rd from the bottom.  on the bottom cone, it is the wide strip of black and brown where the black looks like cannon bombs.  i think they are actually supposed to be berries, but they look like bombs to me, so it ALWAYS gets passed over for ANYTHING i am making....

i thought they looked pretty darned good for prim pinecones, but then, i knew what they were.  when i showed them to (NON-quilty) friends later that night, they were NOT impressed, and did not even know that they were pinecones....back to the drawing board

still wanted that bird in there, and  finally found a nice little pine cone to applique and stitch, so i did....3 of them..

so, that was my block.  it was more time consuming than i thought it would be, i love stitching, but all the design changes, different background for the bird block itself, then, swapped out the nest fabric too...and, it just took forever to stitch all those scales on the pinecones for some reason....and, i am not actually really very happy with it.  i still have to blanket stitch the little branches, but i used french knot eye, satin stitch beak, and then outline and blanket stitch....my fabric i would not normally use in a quilt ended up being the nest fabric....only because it has never actually gone into one but it has been used for many other things...it is celtic knotwork.....

here they are together....dark picture,  but it will have to suffice.....and, when we have to do a paper-pieced technique, i am ready!!!  actually, i am hoping that it will be next clue, and we will build another 5 x 20 strip coz i actually like my first work-up better than this block i ended up with....and, i wanna make a new bird and nest and put it with those cones on the right side......whadda ya think powers that be??? a paper pieced technique on a 5 x 20for number 4???? pretty please with sugar on top??