Here are todays practice pieces. I feel as though they are getting better. 
Whether it shows in the images I am not sure but even compared with yesterdays samples I can see an improvement but perhaps it's just wishful thinking.
I certainly felt confident enough to try a really curved design. You can see the concave part of the curve has long skinny plumes - not good- but for a first and only attempt it's not too bad is it? At lease my plumes are beginning to be more curvaceous and less skinny and jaggedy. I still find it difficult to hug the previous plume, I wonder if an open toed embroidery foot would help? I think it might. I also raised the pressure on the presser foot which helped.
I even felt that one feather was good enough to embellish. This idea is from Patsy's Free Motion Fun With Feathers DVD Volume 1. She calls this section Splay Embellish Feathers. Of course the colours could be better but it's a practice piece and I am delighted with it. If you look closely you will see I found it difficult to retrace my stitching line. A little more practice will sort that out though. My thanks to Deb for her very helpful comment. I may try that suggestion on one of my feathers and see how it works for me.
Thank you to everyone who visits my blog and takes the time to comment. I appreciate your help, advice and support. I hope in some way you will be inspired to try some of things I have posted on my blog and that my tutorials are useful to you. I am certainly inspired by the blogs I visit and appreciate the work and ideas people share.
I hope you and your family have a wonderful, prosperous and happy New Year.
See you all in 2009.