How to 'Holly' for Fiona and anyone else who might be curious

Fiona asked about the free motion holly leaves on the table runner in my last post.

I vaguely remember from my own school days in the dim and distant past (Jacob Marley speaking here folks) a teacher showing me how to draw lifelike holly leaves.

You start off with a curved line for the spine of the leaf and then draw a series of curves along each of the two sides to make the points. Don't worry about having the same number of points on each side, apparently holly leaves are seldom symmetrical and of course having the initial 'spine line' curved gives the leaf much more fluidity.

Well the holly leaf free motion stitching is exactly the same principle - if you look at the diagram you start at the bottom in the red and stitch a curved line in the rough area you wish to fill with your leaf - then once you've reached the far end of the leaf change direction (the line turns to blue) and stitch a series of curves back to the start of your leaf. Once you've joined up with your spine at the start of your leaf change direction again (this time into green on the diagram) and work the corresponding set of curves to join up at the end of the leaf (matching up with where the red turned to blue).

That's your leaf completed - now all you need to do is continue with another curved line for the next spine and repeat the process. The leaves all continue along from each other in a little garland really, so just keep stitching and filling those spaces with leaves as large or small as you like til your area is full.

So go on then - deck the halls with boughs of holly girls!!!