Jane Davidson of Quilt Jane is the designer of The Splendid Sampler‘s latest challenge, she’s one of the organizer’s too and her block is really sweet, not too taxing either, once I’d sorted colours out!

Sunday’s block is a picture of a quilt shop, so it’s a lovely design to personalize. I waited a couple of days before stitching mine to see how others worked their fabrics, getting a bit of inspiration for the embroidery along the way. I still don’t find it easy to work out which colours to use, so facebook is great for getting ideas!

Local Quilt Shop

I was tempted to use the fabric with birds on for the sky, but I decided they were too closely spaced, it could look like a scene from a certain horror movie!! I settled for the cream with a faint pattern that could look like clouds instead, much safer!

For the walls I fussy-cut some fabric, hoping it looks a bit like hanging baskets and flower beds. The doors are 1″ square, I embroidered the ‘Open’ sign to try to make it look a bit taller. However by chance, I found some cotton in my scrap box for the doors and window which had a checked pattern which looked a bit like window frames, on the doors it had the effect of visually narrowing them.

I embroidered the sign but still felt it needed a little something, I rummaged round in my button box and found these tiny blue buttons, I think they must have come in a mixed bag, I certainly don’t remember buying such tiny ones, to give you an idea of just how small they are, just remember that the centre square is 1″ across…mmm tiny!!

We’ve now stitched nine blocks, so we’re nearly a tenth of the way there, 91 to go!! Next block is released tomorrow…