The Road to Friendship

I spent the first week of July painting a quilt top of 2 little girls on a doorstep in Mexico. It's now time to get them and their doorstep quilted.  This is easily a month long project... though I haven't a months free time so I  hope to get this done  by 9-30. We'll see.
In art quilting... I start at the center and work my way outward..upward/downward very methodically. Doing otherwise almost always creates  surface distortion trouble in a large quilt.  SO I begin here with the face of the little girl truly in the center of the quilt.  I have often said it is most important in quilting faces that the beginning and ending of lines of stitching are gracefully aligned with the area ( in this case hair) next to them.  NO harshly seen starts and stops. Now this picture should scare you. As best I can, I try to begin and end a stitch line with a curve aligning somewhat with the edge of the hair.   Do know however this work preceeds quilting the hair so some turns at the hairline will be covered with black hair quilt lines.

If the face is small enough ( this one is) I tend to leave some facial features ( eg. eyes UNQUILTED as the painted surface can offer a softer feel if indeed desired.  We are looking at a foreshortened angle here ( apologies) but note I have not quilted the eyes or mouth, but have secured them with monofilament where needed to "hold things together." The photo angle admittedly gives her a long neck look.  Not so viewed straight on.