My original outline is still here, I haven’t moved any of the original notes. Keeping your chord tones on beats one and three is a good way to make them stand out. These two beats are strong and have a lot of pull to them. Try emphasizing the important notes on those beats.
For this step I highly recommend that you do it on your instrument. You don’t have to write it down. That can present a challenge of it’s own, especially if you’re no used to it. And it’s not necessary. Use your chord tones as way points, there is plenty of space in between them. This is where the scale comes in, I used it to fill in the spaces in between the original notes.
Here you want to think about the direction of your melody. Is it going up or down? Just how many notes are going to go in between your chord tones? What about space?This part of the process is all about experimentation, trial and error. The correct outcome will be the one that sounds good to you. I tried to include a few components in this example.
Measures 1 and 2: The melody goes up and down. I left space in both measures to emphasize the pick up note going to the measure after.
Measure 3: I wanted to create some tension. The harmony is already doping this, using the dominant chord creates instability. I wanted to reinforce that so I introduced another subdivision. The last three notes are the same, the G#. Not only is it the third of the chord, it’s half a step away from my resolution note. It’s also syncopated, which means it’s not on the strong beats. All of these components create tension.
I find that the more facility you have with your instrument the easier this gets. If you’re limited in your proficiency you’ll have less ideas available to you. My note choice was mostly from the minor pentatonic scale. But notice that I’m not completely attached to it because I kept chord tones at the forefront of my melody right from the beginning.