The Splendid Sampler block released this week involved lots of embroidery. It was designed by Alissa Thomas from Penguin & Fish. It’s called Crocheted thoughts and was inspired by memories of her grandma’s crocheted doilies. As I’ve learnt to crochet this year, it seemed fairly apt for me too. It’s a really pretty block, I love the twirling thread around the border.

The center design is embroidered with chain-stitch to look like crochet. The instructions suggested making the block first and then doing the embroidery. I decided to stitch my doily first so my patchwork wouldn’t distort in my embroidery ring. I chose one of the DMC variegated threads that I discovered a couple of weeks ago, it’s really pretty in purple and green. I finally sussed out the chacopy transfer paper and managed to get it to work.

The embroidery seemed to take hours, I went to the local Embroiderers Guild for the first time on Monday so I took it along to sew. I had a lovely day, we all did our own embroidery in the morning, took a pack lunch, in the afternoon we had a speaker whose embroidery was so tiny and delicate you needed a magnifying glass to see the stitches – literally!!

I stitched the middle bit first and then stitched the outline of the ‘petals’. I have to admit that it seemed to take so long that I was very tempted to do the ‘loopy’ bits in back-stitch, thinking it would be quicker. Luckily I decided to persevere with chain-stitch and that bit actually didn’t take that long! I’m really pleased with the end result.

Ohio

I’ve made two other blocks since I last blogged about the Splendid Sampler. ‘Ohio’ was a nice quick to make once I’d chosen my fabrics. It was designed by Sherri McConnell of A Quilting Life. She’s also giving lots of helpful tips over on her blog to help us along our splendid journey. My rabbits didn’t quite position themselves where I wanted but otherwise I think it looks pretty good.

The block released on Thursday was by Pat Sloan, one of the organizers of the whole project. I must admit my heart sank a bit when I saw all those tiny squares, but with lots of spray starch and lots of checking, it’s come out just the right size! I even remembered to twirl my center seams! I don’t know if it’s coincidence but since I changed from a plastic quarter inch foot to a metal one, my blocks have turned out a lot more accurate, it could just be that I’m getting more practiced at the 1/4″ seams.

The last block I’ve stitched this week is for my other Pat Sloan BOM, ‘My Secret Garden’ these are just one a month so it’s a lot easier to keep up with! I really enjoyed stitching this one, but it did seem huge after all the Splendid Sampler ones as this one measures 16 1/2″. I learnt yet another way of stitching triangles, we stitched a pair of 3″ squares together all the way round, and then cut it into four diagonally, making four little patches.

I’m getting quite excited at the moment as I’m having a move round upstairs, my eldest has just moved out, so his bedroom is going to be the guest bedroom. The spare room is going to be my new sewing room, it’s about three times the size of my current one, so I’ve been spending hours planning and dreaming about how I’m going to organize it! I emulsioned and glossed it yesterday so today I can start moving everything in 🙂

I’m linking in with Kathy’s Quilts for Slow Stitching Sunday and Super Mom No Cape for Vintage Embroidery Monday, why not pop over and see what everyone else has been stitching?