Cat Progress

I have been making excelleng progress on the Charley Harper Cat.  Although I'm a total rookie at FMQ, I bit the bullet and used a varigated brown thread and this design to add texture to the bark on the quilt.  (Not sure why this photo bleached out the fabric color so much...)

This pic is more true color.  As I was working on that skinny branch, I realized that I needed to bind the quilt before I finished quilting it.  I realize that 2.5 hours seems like a long time to spend hand stitching the back of the binding on.  But the look is SOOO worth it.

I added the pre-quilted leaves this afternoon and have been quilting them in place using FMQ over the pre-quilted lines.  The lines are far less exact than when I quilted the dimentional leaves using the walking foot. 

I had been thinking about adding secret bugs embroidered on the back of some of the leaves.  But now I'm thinking that I may include them in some machine quilting/stippling b/w the leaves.