Fabric 4x4 quiltie

On one of my groups I am hosting a 4" x 4" fabric quiltie swap!  The theme is open and all that is required is that the quiltie have fabric on front and back with batting in between, some hand stitching and is embellished a little.
 This is the quiltie I made for the swap.  It looks a little different than the little quilties I have been making for my journal covers.  I did buttonhole stitch all around this one instead of the overcast stitch I have been using for the others.  The front is pieced from a few small pieces - flowery for the bottom edge, green for the horizon and floral blue, pink and white for the sky.  The pieces were sewn together by machine and then I trimmed my piece to about 4.75" so I would have enough to roll over for my edge and have it be a 4" x 4" finished size.  I dug through my fabric scrap stash for the house body, the roof and the door.  I applied "iron on hem tape" to the back of each piece using release paper to prevent the iron from sticking to it.  I ironed on the house first, leaving the bottom up from the edge a bit to allow for the border, then I added the brown triangle for the roof and added the door last.  I added the batting, my back and stitched all the way around using white thread and the button hole stitch.  Next, I added extra stitching.  I used brown thread to add several layers of stitching to the roof and then added beads (bugle and ebeads) in brown around the perimeter.  I added a stitched half round window to the door and button hole stitch around the perimeter then I added a yellow ebead to the door to simulate a handle.  I added French knots to all the flower centers on the body of the house and used stem stitch to add some definition to both sides.  Added chain stitch to the top and bottom edges of the green landscape/horizon layer.  I added some random stitches to the sky to give it some texture.  Finally, I added two butterfly beads and a little metal silver heart above the door.

I used navy fabric with a white grid for the back and filled in the squares using several different stitches in several different colours of thread.  I added my copyright using Iron On Label - I simply wrote on the label tape using a fine tip Sharpie and ironed it onto the back.  I added the swap credits and info on a tag and pinned it on the back as well.

It was fun to make a quiltie with a theme and do a a variety of stitches.  I printed off instructions for a few more so I can add more variety next time.
I hope there will be enough interest to make several more of these so we can all have a few pages to bind into a book!!

Therese