Embroidered Collage

  This is as far as I will go on this piece, but the ideas will be transferred to another piece.

I hadn't stitched for a while and thought I'd play with perforated paper - cardstock-weight paper with holes punched in it at regular intervals.  I decided to work within an ATC size piece, in this case a grid of 33 squares by 47 squares.  The idea that came to mind was the branching patterns often found on oriental carpets, which I've sketched in the past.  I also wanted to use a couple needlepoint stitches instead of just cross-stitches.

So I started the dark purple pattern, working back and forth in my mind so I'd have room for the counted elements and fit in the space available.  I thought about a complementary corner pattern and border and filled in part of the background.  I was enjoying myself.

Then I stopped and thought about it.  Did I really want to finish this piece?  Did I want to put all the time into finishing the pattern and stitching the background or I had I learned everything I was going to from it?

I decided to stop.  The paper fully covered by stitching was nice, but it wasn't really my style.  I really liked the pattern I developed, but the value differentiation and colors didn't really pop for me.  I wondered what would happen if I painted the perforated paper and then added certain parts of the pattern.  Could I collage on top of it or just with it?  How would it look overlaid on a similar or contrasting color background? 

I want to take another step and play some more.