Monday Meanderings 10 - 26 - 2026

It's been a busy week of sewing, ironing and reading... yep, I spent some time reading along with the sewing.  

Here's my goals list from last week. 

10/19/26

✅Sew borders on paper pieced pastels top — border on. 

✅Finish Halloween stitchery — all quilting done; just needs binding. 

Quilt a small quilt of mine — a backing is loaded but nothing else done! 

✅Cut pieces for Marigold Oct Clue — 5 of 15 4” blocks are done, the rest are cut out ready for sewing. 

✅Wash, ✅dry, and ✅ iron new fabrics — all marked, folded and stored with same colors. 

I did a fairly decent job of getting my goals accomplished.  Here are some pics. For the fall stitchery I decided to stitch some diagonal lines.  It dawned on me after I quilted it I did the lines in the same direction of the leaves falling off the tree with a bit of wind. It seemed to take forever as each start and stop had to be tied off after stitching.  But it is all stitched now. On to the binding!

Here are the new fabrics I bought at Fork Mountain Quilting in Rocky Mount, Va. during retreat. 

The purple and orange (which is more peach in real life) are for backings of small tops. The white with grey dots is for a background some day. The darker orange and green are for a new project. I've started it but have put it aside for the time being.  I'll share it eventually. 

And here are a few small pieces I picked up on the free table.  I haven't acquired much kids' fabrics recently so I thought these would do well especially because they were free.  I generally make Happy Blocks (visit https://maryquilts.com/happy-blocks-from-charms/ for directions.  Check out Mary's other simple directions for other designs.)  These will make several blocks each. Sorry for the weird photo. I may have enlarged them too much or some thing else weird happened. Eventually I'll use these in a kid's quilt. 

Here are the goals for this week...

10/26 

Quilt large flying geese top

Trim and bind Halloween stitchery

Sew 10 Marigold mystery Oct blocks

Bind second blue quilt from 9/28

Finish one brick top

I've sewn several columns for the brick quilt.  I haven't decided how big I want it yet.  I've been sewing the bricks with squares as my leader ender for a long while. I think I've gone crazy with how many I have to make into quilts.  Here's what I've laid out so far. 

Any suggestions about color placement? I've just been making color columns but need to figure out what order to place them.  I'm not sure it makes much of a difference but any suggestions would be appreciated.  

I've continued the stitching every day.  Here are the numbers.

Week ending 10/25/26: 298 days of 2026.

 296 stitching days out of 298 days 99.3%

I also figured out my fabric usage statistics for the end of the third quarter. I kept forgetting to list them.  So here's what happened during July, August and September along with the rest of this year. I'm very happy to be using more fabric than what I'm bringing into the stash! 

2026	Fabric In Quarter	Fabric In Year to date	Fabric Out  Quarter	Fabric Out Year to Date	Total In or Out Year
1st Quarter	27.250	27.250	33.500	6.250	6.250
2nd Quarter	16.625	43.875	19.200	52.750	8.875
3rd Quarter	14.750	58.625	25.450	78.20	19.750

Before we know, it will be Election Day.  I've already early voted  and I hope you have too. However, if you are planning to vote on Election Day here are some suggestions from Joyce Vance who writes Civil Discourse on Substack and wrote Giving Up Is Unforgivable.

• "If you’re going to vote on Election Day, make sure you know where your polling place is located. Some locations may have changed. Confirm the hours at your polling place and the ID requirements.

• Be prepared for long lines, delays, and other unexpected developments. Keep your cell phone handy, along with an Election Protection hotline number or website, so you can report anything unusual. 

• Remember to stay in line if the polls close while you’re waiting to vote—as long as you’re in line, you’re entitled to cast your ballot.''

  
  

  Happy Quilting All! Bonnie 

Monday Meanderings -- 10 -- 19 -- 2026

What a great week retreating.  I was worried it would be chilly and rainy but the weather turned out beautiful.  No rain going down or coming up. The only rain was overnight. Do you hear me singing "The rain will never fall 'til after sundown" in the background? (For those who don't know it's from Camelot and my folks had the record of the original cast...it got played quite a bit!) 

The retreat was sponsored by a guild in Powhatan, Va where I lived before here. I've maintained my membership as has Sharon as we both enjoy this group of women.(Sharon joined after the first time she went on retreat with us because they didn't have enough members sign up.) It was held at Skelton 4 H Conference Center in Wirtz, Va on Smith Mountain Lake.  It is about 3.5 hours from my home, longer with stops for a meal. I got a lot of my projects completed or moved forward.  Here's how well I did on my goals this past week. 

10/12/26

✅Attend Country Piecemakers retreat — I had a great time!

Make boy and ✅girl 64 charm quilts — held off on the boy quilt as it was hard to lay out. 

✅Make Honey Bouquet baby quilt — done!

✅Sew EQuilter’s blocks into top — done!

✅Put everything away and rest on the weekend! — Almost everything has been put away but not a lot of resting took place.

Here are pics of what I accomplished. I shared this top as it was laid out last week. Now it is a top.  One thing I hadn't noticed was that several of the blocks were not made as the others. And frankly, I don't have any idea why I didn't notice them. I won't be changing the layout though! (Call me lazy 'cause I do not want to rip out all those stitches!). 

This is my 64 Charms baby quilt. I found some charm squares left from a pack of baby squares.  I separated them into boy and girl squares.  Then I added squares from my stash that go with the colors.  Here's the girl one. There will be a boy one eventually but laying the girl one out at retreat was difficult.  I haven't decided if I'll make the boy one at home or maybe just lay it out at home and take it to a March retreat.  I particularly like this top pattern (and the one below) as they only take one length of fabric for the backing. 

Here is the baby version of Honey Bouquet from Villa Designs. This was actually finished but I didn't get a picture of it when done.  I made it smaller than the pattern called for as our baby quilt donations go to the two local NICUs and they want them approximately 36 x 36.  I started with the ABC fabric and added what I could find to go with it.  I'll share it when I get it quilted and bound.

I also made some progress on my leader-ender project but I didn't take any pictures.  My progress on putting everything away is not enough. I still have a bag of goodies.  I also have a quite a few of new fabrics waiting for a spin in the washing machine before they get put away.  I'll share them soon.  

Here's my plan for this week. 

10/19/26

Sew borders on paper pieced pastels top

Finish Halloween stitchery

Quilt a small quilt of mine

Cut pieces for Marigold Oct Clue

Wash, dry, and iron new fabrics 

Do you doubt that I got 15 minutes plus of sewing every day this week? It was way more than that during the retreat days! 

  

Week ending 10/18/26: 291 days of 2026.

 289 stitching days out of 291 days 99.3%

Here's another project I sewed together on retreat. I always precut my projects before going on retreats or sew days. It's much easier to cut on my table that is just right for my height.  Although we put risers under tables for cutting and ironing so if I have to cut it isn't too bad height-wise. I used a very old fabric that really says spring.  I've received a lot of compliments on this top from the retreaters. It actually should have a floral border that finishes at 2". I've decided to leave it as is even though I'd already cut the borders.  They will become the binding. I only have about 10" of the fabric left!  

This is Spring Splash, a free pattern from McCall's Quilting.  Here's the link to the pattern: https://www.quiltingdaily.com/friday-free-quilt-patterns-spring-splash-wall-quilt-pattern-mccalls-quilting-blog/

Even though I didn't get all my "stuff" put away I did get a small top quilted. Ruthie, the long arm, did a great job.  No problems.  Hopefully she'll continue to be reliable. Here's the top I quilted for the local guild. This one is 37" square.  I used New Zealand Kofu by My Creative Stitches.  Unfortunately this picture was taken while the first row was stitching. This top will go back to the guild on Wednesday so that another member can bind it. 

As always I'm linking up with the following Linky parties: Stitching Time, Oh Scrap, Quilting Patchwork Applique, Design Wall Monday, Monday Musings. Just a note: I'm sorry to say I forgot to link up to the Monday Linky parties last week.  I forgot to link up Monday before I left for retreat.  And once there the available Internet connection was pretty bad.  So no links added for the Monday parties.  Hopefully this week I do it correctly! 

I also noted that I didn't receive any emails from my commenters. That lack of emails means I never responded to my comments. I'll be going back and responding this week... sorry for the delay.  

Hubby reports a busy day at early voting in our county today.  He works at early voting every Tuesday and a few other days.  If you haven't voted yet -- get out and do it as soon as possible.  My guess is Election Day will be packed with folks voting.  Make it easier on yourself and opt for early voting. 

Happy Quilting All! Bonnie 

Monday Meanderings 10 -- 12 -- 2026

It's been a week of busy-ness.  We had a couple of rehearsals. I went to stitching group.  The rain has continued off and on.  Our Cabaret show on Friday night went really well.  We had a nice size audience too.  But, hubby and I were exhausted by the time we got home.  And, we were wound up so didn't fall asleep right away.  

Then Saturday rolled in.  Not a busy day except me trying to figure out everything I need to take to retreat.  Finally fell asleep after 11. Fast forward to about 2:30 we were rudely awakened by our fire alarm going off.  We got up and checked the house -- no fire but the alarms (every one in the house) kept going off. And then silence.  Back to bed.  15 minutes later they went off again. Oh good grief! I started reading thinking it was going to go off again. Hubby was cruising the Internet trying to figure out why it was going off.  He figured it out, turned one alarm off and restarted it. That was it! Finally, sleep came at about 4. Snore! 

That brings us to my goals list for this past week. 

10/5/26

✅Cut out boy 49 charm quilt — done! 

✅Work on Christmas ornaments — it doesn’t look like I made progress but I did stitch on one. 

Stitch on Snowman # 2 — didn’t do anything. 

Bind second blue quilt — binding made but not applied. 

✅Sing at the Cabaret with the Spotsylvanians — we had a great time singing and a wonderful audience. 

✅Prep supplies for retreat — mostly packed. 

These are my blocks from the FCQ EQuilters in 2025. There are only 6 of us and I got all of these blocks plus another 13 or so more. The blocks are 12 x 12". I am taking these to retreat to sew together.  The day Sharon and I go shopping I may take it with me to get a border for it.  I'm not sure it really needs it but I might add one. Although I suspect I would add a smaller border. I'll probably put this together on Monday so it is portable on our shopping day. 

Here's what's in store this week. 

10/12/26

Attend Country Piecemakers retreat

Make boy and girl 64 charm quilts

Make Honey Bouquet baby quilt

Sew EQuilter’s blocks into top

Put everything away and rest over the weekend! 

I stitched every day this past week.  Some was only 15 minutes but most were a lot more time.

Week ending 10/4/26: 284 days of 2026.

 282 stitching days out of 284 days 99.3%

I wanted to share a great idea for brushing dust out of your sewing machine.  I credit Sharon with coming up with the idea. 

That nice fuzzy brush is by Elf which makes make up and accoutrements for make up. The brush is called Total Face and is available at Target for $4.00.  The bristles are artificial. I dusted the underside of my Featherweight, around the motor and on along the edges of the base.  I was surprised how much dust clung to the brush. I bought three of them: one for each sewing machine I use regularly.  I'll let you know in a few weeks how it works for me. 

Here are the Linky Parties I use.  Please visit. Stitching Time, Oh Scrap, Quilting Patchwork Applique, Design Wall Monday, Monday Musings.

I probably won't link up with Monday parties until Monday evening. (Yep, I'll be on the road to retreat for most of the morning.)  

I wanted to share some more voter information with you. Do you know about the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe? Their mission: "We work for stability, peace and democracy through an engaged political dialogue, shared values and joint action."  One of the actions they take is observing elections around the world. They have been observing American federal elections since 2002.  The administration has chosen to not invite them this year.  Instead, more than 1,000 federal election monitors will be sent out to the states by the Justice Department. That isn't unusual either.  Previously Justice Department has monitored federal elections to protect American voters.  My question now is will they continue to protect voters or will they impede voters or intimidate voters or try to seize voting machines.  If you want to find out more about this check Michael Seller's October 8, 2026 Substack. (Substack.com) You can read more about the OSCE at their web site: https://www.osce.org/#our-mission-1.  

Happy Quilting All!  Bonnie 

 

Monday Meanderings 10 - 5 - 2026

Rain! Rain! And More Rain.  We've had several days of it and I'm getting tired of it.  I've walked the dog 2 nights with heavy mist.  I come back in wet and so does Sunny.  It looks like the rain is ending tonight.  Temperatures are going to be in the 70s during the days and mostly in the 50s at night. But, wait -- some nights it's going to be in the 40s.  I prefer the cooler weather.  I'm done with the ridiculous heat for this year.  I hope Mother Nature agrees with me! 

On the other hand, the rain gave me I a good reason to play in the studio.  I was basically done with my Goals list by Thursday evening.  Friday morning we sang in a neighborhood chorus and that afternoon I goofed off.  See below about my daily sewing times. And, just below for what I did this week. 

9/28/26

✅Finish Honey Bouquet top — Top done ! 

✅Bind small blue quilt — Done! 

✅Quilt another small top — Done but not bound

✅Layout top and ✅sew 2025 RSC blocks — Done!

✅Finish cutting kit for retreat — Done! 

✅Anything that strikes my fancy — Borders on Halloween stitchery.

I didn't take more pictures of the finished Honey Bouquet top.  Here's the link to last week's picture of it. I added a horizontal row to the top of the quilt.  Easy peasy and I had cut too many rectangles anyway.  I'll share it again after I quilt it. 

No pics of the bound quilt. I'm happy to have it done and was able to load another blue top that was quilted using the rest of the dark blue backing fabric. This was at the beginning. It's a Benny quilt using a lot of my 2" unf squares. (Although those little 2" squares pile back up really fast!) 

Unfortunately I'm having a few issues with Ruthie, the long arm. I think one of the connecting wires is slipping or not maintaining the connection.  Hubby took a look at it and tried something that should hold the connection through an entire quilt.  But, I haven't done another quilt yet.  

Sewing the RSC 2025 blocks together was on my UFO Challenge this fall.  I was able to get them laid out and sewn together. Now to consider borders. 

Here's the beginning of cutting out my 49 Charm quilt pattern. Thanks go to Nancy who blogs at Grace and Peace Quilting for the idea.  She makes 99 Charm quilts that finish 41 x 50".  My 49 Charm quilt will be 36" square, approximately. It is based on what is wanted at the NICU at the local hospital. I had some 5" squares from a charm pack that had baby girl squares.  I added some more fabric and came up with 49 charms.  It will be made at retreat next week. 

And, what was my "anything that strikes my fancy"?  I decided to add the borders to the owl stitchery I showed a while ago. I am thinking about how to finish it. Any suggestions? I'm thinking of batting and backing, quilting in the ditch and maybe some extra bats flying in the stitchery to hold everything together.  

Now, here's my plan for this week.  

10/5/26

Cut out boy 49 Charm quilt

Work on Christmas ornaments

Stitch on Snowman # 2

Bind second blue quilt

Sing at the Cabaret with the Spotsylvanians

Prep supplies for retreat

I've been doing so well on my 15 minutes of stitching every day.  Except Friday, after singing and buying lunch, we came home and ate it in our sun room. It was warm and cozy and we all fell asleep for at least an hour. I finally woke up and realized I had to make Apple Squares to take to the pot luck we were attending that night. So baking happened, reading happened, socializing happened.  But no stitching! Oops. I've missed 2 days out of 277 this year. 

Week ending 10/4/26: 277 days of 2026.

 275 stitching days out of 277 days 99.3%

I am looking forward to next week's retreat.  I plan to get a lot of sewing done, some shopping, and one lunch out. I usually take Sharon out in honor of her birthday.  This year it lands on Friday so we'll go earlier in the week. I'll try to take more pictures of the finishes this year. I tend to forget. 

Please check out the following links to read what people across the Internet are making: Stitching Time, Oh Scrap, Quilting Patchwork Applique, Design Wall Monday, and Monday Musings.

Are you looking for a sew along or a mystery quilt this fall?  Take a look at my last post which lists both sew alongs and mystery quilts that have recently started or starting soon.  

As we move closer to Election Day I hope you have been reminding your friends, family, and neighbors to vote.  Remember, America is a free country where your vote can make a big difference in all of our futures.  

Happy Quilting All! Bonnie