Arlene's Silk Ribbon Embroidery RR

I'm in the sunny south with a tee shirt, shirt and two sweatshirts.  The weather has been pretty cool and I've had to keep my hands warm somehow!

I'm working on Arlene's Silk Ribbon Embroidery RR with CQI.  Her block is so pretty, all pinks.  It came from Candji who was the first to work on this block.  This picture is the block after both of our work.  My contribution was the very middle patch.  I usually am not so bold as to pick the middle, but this time it was the perfect shape for what I had in mind.  I added two tall stalks of hollyhocks, clusters of iris, daisies and snapdragons, with panseys and some un-named little flowers in the very front.  I  covered the two top seams with a dark maroon 4mm ribbon randomly attached with tiny pink beads.   Mostly I used variegated and plain 2 and 4mm silk ribbons, except for the hollyhock leaves which were done with 13mm ribbon. 

The next photo is a close up of the middle section. 

Just above the centre there was a nice little triangle that I put in an assortment of gathered ribbon flowers and leaves.  The two seams are herringbone in 4mm ribbon with some pink seed beads at the "V"s.