Carefree Highways is a finished quilt!

This is the picture that I submitted for the AQS New England show– two days early, might I add. I’ve painstakingly overthought everything from not getting accepted to winning a major award to hoping little Harlow has it on her bed for the Tricentennial and my brain is exhausted!

You also have to submit a detail of your quilting:

and a headshot:

In all my submission photos, I’m most proud of the fact that the head shot is RECENT and is not PHOTOSHOPPED. I happen to know a lot of these profile pics we put up on Facebook and the like are from 20 years ago, people– come on!

The quilt contest notifications will be sent out on December 16th, and you’ll be the first to know. For now, I’m folding it up to get a rest from looking at it. The longarm wants something NEW to do– it will be fun to decide what that will be.

I really didn’t get enough Halloween last Friday– not even a bag of candy corn. Nothing would be scarier for a trick or treater than walking down our long, lonely driveway past the NO TRESPASSING sign, except me who’d be frightened out of my wits if somebody walked down at night! To celebrate it a little more, I’d love to throw Pumpkin Kitty on the longarm, or the other diamond Halloween quilt I made last year. Or maybe make a couple more bat blocks from the Night Flight quilt! Only then can Halloween be over.

My Home Sweet Home quilt really came along last week– after making the Pumpkin Kitty quilt in a couple of weeks, I’m starting to see the potential for getting things done faster.

What am I doing differently? I’ve been cutting everything at once, sewing everything at once, etc. Before, I would cut and sew a couple houses and then make a couple more. I’m also putting the pedal to metal– after watching some “Sew with Me” type videos on YouTube, it made me realize how slow I am at the actual machine. You know– Tap, tap, tap, tap. Tap. It should be V-ROOOOOOOOOM! And finally, I totally cleaned off my big sewing table which has saved time trying to find a corner to trim something. I’m extremely optimistic I can bring quite a few UFOs over the finish line before the end of the year.

From the picture, I thought these house blocks were tiny 6″ cuties– they are 15″! Since the quilt is large, I might even add a fancy border around it and get a good bed size– there are dozens of red, white, and blue collections coming out for 2026 and I’m sure I’ll find something perfect.

Finally, working on one thing at a time is a big boost to finishing. I’m going to finish HOME SWEET HOME first, then I’m going back to my HO, HO, HO Reindeer quilt that has been shelved for too long. I want to use my extra fabric from that quilt to finish the Holly Horse stocking, so I’ll need to see what I have left.

Block Ten of “A Year on Sugar Meadow” released! I can’t believe there are only two left to go. Here are some of my inspiration photos– just so you know I’m not making this stuff up!

These little leaves are so delicate and green even in October. If you ever think you know all the leaf shapes that exist in nature, you need to look more closely!

They belong to this flower head.

And here it is!

I’m not sure what’s coming in November– but December is going to be a chickadee in the pines and maybe some berries in honor of Maine. The chickadee is our state bird and the pinecone is our flower. I never knew a pinecone was a flower, did you?

The rains have returned, and it is surprising how quickly the lake is refilling! One of my dull pleasures has been checking the U.S. Drought Map when it updates every Thursday– nothing has changed. Apparently, it takes a long time for the ground water to be replaced, so we will probably be in Extreme Drought for the winter. At least we’ll be able to skate on the pond. It’s starting to get chilly here, and for the first time I’m a bit worried about just how cold and just how many snowstorms we will have. There is no Florida vacation planned for this year. We’ll have to wait and see. Snowy, the baby chicken, will need her downy coat!

Finally, I worked the Summer Sampler along this much– I even jumped ahead a bit with the back stitch, just for you, so you could see how the cherries look. You’re welcome!

An epic week with an epic finish– which road to go down next? We have all winter to create, create, create.

xox
Carol