Rough around the edges, but what fun!  I created layers, cut with the free select tool, copy and pasted the leaf background, moved P&J over a little. 

original, lasso with feather edges below…high feather setting

No feathered edge:

feathering set to 100 percent

not seeing the differences….

Saving as JPEG vs a gimp file.  Feather edge option. 

Thank you for the suggestions to focus on the tree  image and find the interesting details, Sharon and classmates.   I’m looking for simple shapes that can be translated to stitch or piecing.   Not sure where these are going, but just starting.    I’ve added a high contrast version next to the original, accentuating the lines:

A cross:

A double cross:

Interesting division of the space:

Radiating from the center

Funny face, just for fun:

Original photo, on right, adjusted:

Hue 100 percent, lightness at 0, saturation 100 percent. 

This will be very useful…glass is hard to get right because of the color and reflections. 

Contrast at 98%, brightness increased slightly

Seems by adding brightness to a very dark photo, the photo becomes washed out and hazy.

For instance:

Original photo, on right is the altered photo with 75% brightness added:

Maybe I will learn of other color tools that will correct this….and save this photo.

Sharpened to 50%

Original:

sharpened 75%

very subtle….