A mermaid block and a fairy block

With my renewed determination to finish Maria's quilt, I have been working on a couple of blocks for it. I think they will probably be the most time consuming blocks which will go into the quilt. The kind of blocks you'd only make for a quilt for someone you really love.

First up a mermaid...

I drew her on a scrap of linen, and stitched around my drawing a couple of times.

With a rainbow tail to match Maria's!

Here the scales are just cut out and roughly arranged to give an idea of how they'll look.

 

Then starting to sew them on, from the bottom up.

Here they are all stitched down, I changed my thread for each colour layer, definitely a labour of love!

A background created, ready for the mermaid to dive deep... 

And after some careful cutting out, in she goes...

And I stitched her down with a couple of lines of stitching all around - again with thread colour changes on her tail!

And that's just the bit that's hidden in the block!

Here's the finished block...

 And out comes the mermaid...

More info on making a block with a 'flap' back here.

 And then just a couple of finished photos of this next one. A simpler block...

Hiding a little fairy on a toadstool...

The toadstool needs some spots still, I haven't decided yet whether they will be embroidered or tiny, white buttons.

This one is very much a mini version of my original, and rejected, block for the quilt. Vaguely Maria-ish but I didn't stress about trying to make her identical, it's just too small to manage, for me anyway!

I think that's now 7 of 12 blocks done, so over half way at least, and I have a plan for the remaining 5 too. Still seems a long way left to go though.

Sally.