Wonder while you wander

I've had this on my design wall minus the hiking shoes, dog and sailboats for months just waiting for the right idea to come along to take it from an ok landscape to "oh! Cool!" Someone on Instagram posted a photo of their feet and a mountain vista and that got me going.

 

I traced the feet onto white fabric with a pencil, then layer it over black felt. First I tried with just the fabric and my machine would not accept that. She likes stability before she will free motion correctly so I obey. So then quilted over the pencil lines in black thread. Using my Inktense pencils I first painted clear hair gel all over it and then colored in. As you can see my first try was way to orange.

 

But once it dried the legs were actually perfect so I just browned up the shoes a bit. I think they came out great! The only thing I would do differently next time is use a different white base fabric. It frayed a lot when I sewed it onto the quilt. I need to use something with a tighter weave so it doesn't fray.

Since I'm doing a series of "wander quilts" I call this Wonder while you Wander which is another Instagram inspiration. Someone commented on a water quilt I posted that she orders while she wonders and I loved that - so thank you to both of the Instagram people who helped my get this boring landscape off my wall!

Go forth and wander!

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