September & October 2026 - An early fall recap

Life was busy these past two months with two trips and my dad's final days. Thank goodness for these hobbies that help you keep your hands busy while you travel, spend time with loved ones, and think about all the things. This will be a long one as I will recap the last two months of stitching and sewing/quilting projects. 

It seems like the beginning of September was ages ago - my cousin and her family came for a visit at the start of the month and it was great to see them all. The month found me prepping for my retreat, spending a day with my husband's family at their annual family campout, and spending time with my dad, plus lots of work activity. It was good to have some time in the evenings and weekends for craft endeavors, and I set a goal in September to make a good dent in my projects to be fully finished on the stitching side. I am happy to say that I made great progress, fully finishing seven items in the month. I also had a few quilting finishes and stitching finishes. 

Here are the September projects. 

American House Sampler by Annie Beez

Stitched on PTP 28 ct. Glacier with called for threads

Finished in a black Mill Hill frame

Autumn Alphabet on 32 count Autumn Gold by Lakeside with called for colors
Finished on a board from Chantelle's 141, painted with wood stain

Spooky Fence by Raise the Roof Designs
Stitched on 32 ct. Stormy Night Lugana with mostly called for colors
Finished on a Chantelle 141 board

Might-TEA Fobulous by Silver Creek Samplers
Stitched and finished with kit materials

Blizzard Valley by Pigeon Coop Designs
Stitched on 25 ct. Lugana with called for colors
Finished on a cutting board from the Target Dollar Spot

Kaleidoscope by Yasmin's Made with Love
Stitched on 40 ct. Butter with called for threads
Finished in a (cheap!) 8x10 frame from Michael's 

London bookmark - made from a kit a long, long time ago
Finished as a bookmark with sticky-back velvet
(Don't ask me why it took 15+ years to FFO this one)

American Flag by Erin Elizabeth Designs
Stitched with Colour & Cotton threads on 32 ct. white linen

Liberty mini-quilt top
Made with stash fabrics

Zoey Zips by Lazy Girl Designs
I made these as retreat gifts and included threads from
Colour & Cotton and BeStitchMe in each bag

Witch Hazel, a quick start and finish at my retreat
Stitched on 32 ct. Pistachio lugana from Atomik Ranch
I changed the dress color to Colour & Cotton Nightshade
 so it would pop on the green fabric

I will do a separate post to share all about my retreat - our group went to Utah and spent a long weekend stitching and shopping. 

October started with my spending precious time with my dad before his passing. I took my stitching with me as I sat and talked to him. I didn't tend to get a lot of stitches in, but it was good to have it handy. I did have a few finishes, an FFO and some sewing time in October too.  

Here are  October's projects: 

Bunny Spool by Crafty Bluebonnet
Stitched on a mystery 30 ct evenweave with called for colors
Finished just as on the pattern, with wool roving and lizard litter
in the pillow to give it some heft. 

The back of bunny spool! I need to get a pompom to add for the bunny tail. 

Harvest Home, a kit from Shepherd's Bush
Stitched on 7 ct. Linen with kit threads

Taurus by Satsuma Street Designs
Stitched on 25 ct. Black Lugana with called for colors

Santa from Santa & Rudolph by Dirty Annie's
Stitched on 25 ct. Waterfall from Forbidden Fiber Co 
with the called for threads

After looking at my dusty lamp at retreat, I decided it was high time to make a lamp cover to keep the dust off it. I offered to my retreat friends that I'd be happy to make them one too and could make it to match their bag fabric. I started with the one in the top right as my prototype. It fits my lamp okay, but I decided to make them a little bigger. Five more bags were made (one of them already given to my mom and I forgot to get a picture!) and now I just need to drop them in the mail. I think they turned out pretty cute and I was really thrilled to use some of the trims that I bought in NY this spring as the drawstrings for them. 

I started a new quilt this month, The Iowa Barn Quilt that I bought on my shop hop earlier this summer. I decided to start with some of the simpler blocks - these are "watermelon" blocks and will have black wool seeds added to them. It was fun to get started on this quilt and I have the next set of blocks cut out and ready to be made, I hope to get to them this month. 

Late in the month we headed to New York to see my daughter run her senior show (she's studying Stage Management). We took a few extra days and explored Long Island, which was so pretty with the beaches and fall colors.

We saw Hamilton on Broadway

Jenna in her Stage Manager chair for the show Enron (this was pre-show)

Beautiful views from Montauk Lighthouse

And more beautiful views from Caumsett State Park on Long Island

We wrapped up the month with a beautiful Halloween night. We moved our fire pit to our driveway, chatted with neighbors, had some yummy pumpkin beer, and enjoyed seeing all the kids in their costumes come through. I am so glad to be in autumn and looking forward to cooler temps and pretty leaves as we head into November. 

Here are the stats - I've combined the last two months together: 

Stitching time with Kate at Life in Pieces - 

Days with at least 15 minutes of crafting in September: 25/30 = 83%

Days with at least 15 minutes of crafting in October: 23/31 = 74%

I plan to get back into the 90% range for November and am hoping to put some good progress into my larger WIPs while also balancing some time in the sewing room to get some additional quilt blocks made. 

Stash Report with Donna at quiltpaintcreate: 

Fabric added last two months: 1/4 yard

Fabric used last two months: 1 3/4 yards

Fabric added year to date: 20 1/4 yards

Fabric used year to date: 4 1/2 yards

Net fabric used: -16 1/2 yards

I didn't count the fabric used for the watermelon blocks yet...I think I will wait a bit until I have more used to count it for the quilt top. 

Project Completion progress: 

Stitching projects: +5 completed, -8 FFOs = 43 waiting to be FFO'ed

Quilting projects: 0 completed, +1 new start = 11 projects waiting to be fully finished

Thanks for stopping by to see what I've been up to and hope that you enjoyed seeing all the pictures. See you again in a week or so when I will be back to recap my retreat and trip to Utah.