A makeover for the goldfinch

Forgive my giant photos, I wanted to show you some before and after shots of the applique with embroidery and the difference it's made to the applique.

Here's my wee Goldfinch  prior to any embellishing.

Here he is after a small amount of coloured pencil shading around the yellow parts. Sandra Leichner explains how to do this on her blog here if curious minds want to know.

Doing the embroidery on the eye makes  a whole world of difference. I used simple straight stitches with floss for the highlight and three rows of sewing weight thread in stem stitch to outline the eye.

I put the thimble there in case you were wondering how tiny that appliqued circle was. I actually measured it just for you and it was 3/8" before embroidery. You can see I did the beak as well.

Isn't he just the most handsome little fella? All the embroidery is completed and he looks like he's about to fly off at any moment. The feathers and outlines are again done with sewing weight thread in some sections and embroidery floss in others. I used a  hoop to control the tension

I've also highlighted most of the flower petals and am now starting on the background embroidery.

I pinched this photo of the male Goldfinch to show you the real thing in case like me,  you don't live in America and have never seen a real one