An experiment in flower making

This is a detail of a small quilt of branches of a spring flowering tree. I had magnolias in mind but they're looking a bit more cherry blossom-y.

The method was :  I layered four pieces of fabric. The top is the green hand dyed background of the design. Underneath is ivory, light pink and deeper pink. I added the branches which are zigzag stitched on.  The I snipped into all three fabrics so I had six sections which I turned back and ironed -- that is tricky because they don't want to be ironed.  Then I filled the empty middle space with a knot of a strip of one, and sometimes two, of the pinks.  The knots seems to be a tightly furled bud with petals opening around it.  I tacked the end of the knoted pieces in back so they would not slip around.

I used a picture from a book of Japanese arts for the placement of twigs and flowers, but I'm not very happy with my choice.  Nevertheless, it's a few limbs.  I will include the full picture of this little quilt, which I have finished with a pillow case style backing and a narrow band of hot pink piping at the edge. I think of this as mainly an experiment.