In between other chores today I've been trying out different ideas for the border of the applique quilt.  I want to make a small vine border, and then use some pink fabric as the outer border.  I made a mockup in EQ7, which also let me calculate yardage amounts;

I used the measurements from this to draft up a small vine in my cad software, then printed out a couple of copies to pin to the quilt. (Mereth does all this by hand, using pens and compasses and coloured card, her applique mock-ups are little works of art).

I also used a setting on my phone to convert the photos to black and white, which let me concentrate on the shapes without being distracted by the colours.

 I didn't like that small inner pink border, it was much better to have the vine border against the centre part of the quilt, and the outer pink border as a frame.

 I went back to the drawing board and decided to reverse the little leaves, so that the rounded end was against the vine, and designed a corner motif so that the vine ended behind it, and I won't have to figure out how to get the bias strip going continuously around the whole quilt.

So now I have some idea where I'm going with this, and I can get busy making lengths of bias for the vine, printing out templates for the leaves, and choosing the fabric for the vine background.  The original white fabric is long gone, so I will have to find something that matches, but I'm not too worried about that.  The two fabrics won't ever touch, and the difference between them will be toned down by the setting triangles.

I'm doing this little border mainly because I have two other UFOs that need applique borders, and I want to have a practice with something simple before I tackle anything more complex.  I'm getting very impatient to see this finished, because I will be able to take two things off the UFO list, and I will finally have an applique quilt top to my credit.

Arrgghh!  Now I like the leaves the way I had them the first time!!  Good thing I have plenty of time to decide which way to place them, I have to get all the vines appliqued first.  It will be quite a while before I start on the leaves.