A Valentine Experiment

This week I have this Valentine I made for my husband. It's a small placemat for him to use when he has his coffee in the morning. 

I have also experimented with photography.  The top photo was taken outside, the second indoors.  The first (outdoor) pic has much truer color but I did not get the angle of the camera right and so the poor placemat looks uneven, but I promise it is nice and square! Or should I say rectangular.  :)  Photography is a whole art unto itself!!

My husband is so sweet to accept and use the things I make - even when they are experiments or prototypes like this one is. 

I was inspired by some videos I found on Youtube by Zazu's Stitch Art and wanted to give her technique a try. I am a fan of raw edge applique and often applique by machine without the use of fusibles. I have appliqued using this method many many times which you can see here and here. So I was excited to learn this new (to me) technique as well.  Zazu's method uses freemotion stitching - which I would not have been able to do a few years ago, but I am much more comfortable with freemotion quilting/sewing now and I was pleased with this first project using this technique.  

The variegated thread was really fun to sew with and I love how the colors added to the overall design.

That's it for this post.

Hope you all had a Happy Valentine's Day and I hope you have a creative week ahead.

Thanks for visiting and for your kind comments!  I'd love to see what you have been working on.

-Laney

Linking up with Crazy Mom Quilts, Show Off Saturday