Paisley postcard finished

I reverted to Plan A and made it into a postcard. I couldn't resist adding more embellishment, of course. Adding the orange french knots to the laid work in the yellow motif drew the eye straight to the top left hand corner, so I added some more orange to the larger motif to balance it up and then I thought it needed some beads. The background is stitched in chain stitch in dark blue and green, the different colours don't show up well in the photo. I zigzagged it to a piece of craft vilene (pellon), then covered the edge and the stitching in buttonhole stitch in the same colour as the laid work on the larger motif. There's been a slight departure from traditional crewel and I think the 'tail' on the yellow motif is an improvement. It turned out to be a difficult shape to satin stitch round smoothly without a break.

Here's a close up:




(click on photos for bigger image)