Poppy Heads

So this is what I want to be able to do - finally!
I want more time to be able to play about with projects like this, leave them lying around while I decide what to do next, come back to them when I'm ready and really work through ideas. I'm very pleased with this but I expect it will be ages before I produce something else along these lines.
I started off by playing with needlefelting -can't afford/don't have room for an embellisher but it's surprising what results you can get very quickly just using hand needling. I used butter muslin laid over a bit of wadding and then wool roving. After it was done I decided to paint the background! Each stage of this I decided to paint afterwards instead of first as I would have done if I'd had any sense! Also added beads to the flower centres.
Then I wanted to have a go at fabric paper following the instructions in Beryl Taylor's book 'Mixed-Media Explorations'. I have tried this before but the paper came unstuck from the backing fabric after a while. I don't know what I did differently apart from using butter muslin as the backing this time instead of calico and the piece is well and truly stuck. However I stuck the needlefelted piece on at the same time - as I was doing it I knew it was a mistake but I kept going - why? Anyway, I managed with it like this though it would have been easier to attach it later. I used stamped scraps from my scrap drawer (always makes me feel virtuous) and then added more stamping along with drawing inks over the top. The poppy head is a rubber stamp and for the centre piece I stamped it and enlarged it on my copier then traced it onto handmade paper and stitched and beaded it. Then I added the colour! I stitched it onto the background with oversize, uneven cross stitches then added more over the rest of the piece to tie it all together. The photo shows it cropped beautifully to a finished piece but in reality I haven't yet decided how to finish it off - I think it would look nice in a frame painted dark blue - if I ever get round to it.