What Are Quilters Blogging About Today?

 Well, October is officially a wrap.  The trick-or-treaters have gone home and my husband, younger son, and I have set ourselves to the task of finishing off the leftover candy.  I've powered off my long arm machine for the night, even though I'm only 2/5 of the way through quilting the baby quilt that was supposed to be Part Two of my One Monthly Goal for October.  Here's what Charlie's quilt looks like so far:

My Letter Home Monogram Baby Quilt is 2/5 Quilted

I'm finally able to share my Modern Baby Clam Shells finish with you!  Its final name is "Butterflies in Margot's Garden," named after the little girl for whom it was made.  (This quilt is my original design; no pattern currently available).

Butterflies in Margot's Garden, Before Washing, 42" x 42"

 Hello, my lovelies!  It felt good to step away from the blog for a few days.  

We brought our 19-year-old son home from college for the weekend so he could cast his very first vote in a Presidential election during Early Voting rather than having to change his voter registration to his college address.  My 17-year-old son has strong opinions about the election that he believes we're all entitled to hearing, and he is not pleased to be the only nonvoting member of the family.  ;-). Hah!

I made more progress on my baby quilt version of the AQS "Letter ...

 Might as well just get to the meat and potatoes this week!  Last week's goals turned out to be overly ambitious:

✅ finish quilting Modern Baby Clam Shells, AND 

✅ get it labeled and   

❌ bound, AND  

❌ get my Letter Home baby quilt top and ready to load on my frame.  

After quilting the pantograph design over most of my Modern Baby Clam Shells quilt and stitching in the ditch around my butterfly appliqués  a quilter who was more goal oriented and focused than I am would have finished up the quilting with some monofilament or color matched thread to machine quilt ...

 I'm late to the OMG (One Monthly Goal) party this month, slipping in my link right before the OMG goal setting linky closes over at Elm Street Quilts.  I did not meet my September goal, and wasn't sure what my October goal should be.  So hard to pick ONE goal when so many are swirling around my monster to-do list!

October OMG Part I: Modern Baby Clam Shells Quilt

Okay, so my October OMG is going to be a two-fer-one special, because these two quilts are going to the same home.  By the time Halloween rolls around, I ...

 Good morning, my lovelies!  Welcome to another episode of Long Arm Learning, where the focus is on honing our machine quilting skills, regardless of what kind of machine you're using.

As for myself, although I spent much of the week mired in English paper piecing of another baby quilt top, I did finally get around the impasse of procrastination and got about 2/3 of my Modern Baby Clam Shells quilted yesterday.  The hardest part was starting; I really did not want to mess it up after spending so much time on the curved piecing and the appliqué.  I ...

Good morning and Happy Tuesday!  If you're looking for my Long Arm Linky party, that's in a separate post here, where I've written about my favorite method of joining batting scraps together.  This post is my wrap-up/reckoning regarding what I accomplished last week and what I'm hoping to get done in this last full week of September.

Looking at goals from last week, I hear the band Meatloaf singing in my head: "Now don't be sad, 'cause two out of three ain't bad!"  

Recap of Last Week's Goals:

• ✅ Load & Quilt pantograph on ...

 Oh my gosh, you guys -- how is it Tuesday AGAIN?!  Last week, my big focus was on finishing up the quick and easy (NOT!) baby quilt top that I dreamed up in December of 2018.  It was for a baby who is now nearing two years old and who will become a big sister on or about October 1st.  I finished the curved piecing of these 9 1/2" giant clam shells last week and added a 2" outer border matching the background fabric, just enough so the clam shells float away from the binding when it's finished.  And ...

 Good morning and happy Labor Day weekend to readers in the United States!  I am DELIGHTED to share that I finally finished piecing the body of my Modern Baby Clam Shells quilt top!  

I'll be adding 2" borders in the same Grunge Sky background fabric later today.  For the moment, I'm just reveling in my smooth curves and the fact that this top came out so flat and so square.  

[Note to self: Machine piecing a clam shell quilt combines Y-seams with curved seams.  Definitely doable, but it was fiddly and tedious and it took me a week ...

 Hello, my lovelies, and welcome to the 5th installment of the Long Arm Linky party!  Also, welcome to September.  I think we're all hoping September will be better than August, July, June, May, April, or March...

I do not have machine quilting content to share with you of my own because I've been focused on getting a LONG overdue baby quilt pieced.  Hopefully I will be able to get that on my frame for quilting soon, because this is my OMG (One Monthly Goal) for September.  

September's One Monthly Goal: 

• Piece, Quilt, & Bind My Modern Baby Clam ...

Hello, my lovelies!  My one and only weekly goal last week was to START -- just to start, not to finish, mind you! -- piecing my Modern Baby Clam Shells quilt.  I created the design in my EQ8 software in December of 2018, with a specific baby in mind whose due date was several weeks away...  Then it took me awhile to find the 9.5" acrylic clam shell templates I wanted to use (from an Australian Etsy seller who has since closed her shop).  Then I hemmed and hawed about the best way to cut out completely accurate 9.5" diameter ...

 Oh my gosh, you guys -- this is a rare surprise.  There are still 7 whole days left in the month of August, and I just realized that I have finished all of the quilting goals I'd set for this month.  Finished them EARLY.  I know, right?!  Who IS this imposter, and what has she done with the REAL Rebecca Grace?!

And it's not like I was wimpy with those goals, either.  Let's recap:

August Quilting Goals: