The Doe - Working the background

In the past I have used a lot of preprinted "cheater" cloth. Material that had a forest scene or a winter theme. I want to move away from that so I have tried a few different things. Smaller pieces each part of the background can be cut and sewn or thread painted. I have tried tiling and it has some great features about it. But this time I wanted to try a random mosaic look for the distant forest. Patches of fall leaf colour and bright sky shining through.

I started with some batik fat quarters, selected 7 and cut strips roughly 2 inches wide. These I sewed together randomly.

 

 

 

 

The 3 browns were almost a match to the Doe and two multies of orange and greens represented the fall leaves.

After sewing 2 strips together I cut them all into 2 inch pieces and re-stitched everything again and again till I have a full panel. This will be the placed immediately behind the Doe.

 

 

But of course, the sky is not regular patches in the forest. So I took the rotary cutter and made 5+slashes.

 

 And sewed it all back together again. I had hoped I might avoid this part but it looks so much better.