Seasonal Goal Update: Autumn 2026
Hello Friends and Happy Autumn!
Over the last few weeks, the weather has been getting cooler, bright reds and golds have begun blooming on the leaves of the trees, and the calls of migratory geese fill the air!
Surrounded by so many beautiful changes, I've been excitedly anticipating the arrival of a new season. And with today's equinox, Autumn has finally arrived!
As is my custom, I'll be greeting this new season by looking back at the projects I've been working on, checking my progress towards recent goals, and looking forward to the exciting possibilities that every new season brings!
I can't wait to show you!
Summer Goals
Thinking back over the Summer season, I'm not particularly optimistic about my progress.
My sewing machine moved into the house much later than I did, and especially over the last few weeks, renovations have taken over much of the time I usually dedicate to my stitching projects.
Of course, this doesn't mean that I've been unproductive with my time, I simply suspect that the goals I made at the beginning of Summer didn't end up reflecting the realities of what I faced throughout the season.
But let's take a look and find out together!
Countering my predictions, I think I've been fairly successful in completing my first two goals!
Those were to continue documenting my work with weekly posts here on the Fibre Arts blog and to share updates on social media between blog updates!
Though there were some weeks I was pretty quiet on social media, I feel that my more active weeks made up for it! And for the blog itself, I didn't miss any posts at all last season!
Moving on to my actual projects, this next goal was for my Stitches in Stone quilt along pattern; the three parts of this goal were to finish the digital mock ups, draft pattern instructions, and piece a sample!
Looking back, I recall that my intention was to have all of these steps completed before launching the quilt along, but that didn't end up happening.
However, I have made progress towards each of these steps and I managed to launch the quilt along a month early to align with my birthday at the beginning of August!
All in all, I would consider this a partial success!
Stitches in Stone is my own original design, by Valerie Anne of the Fibre Arts blog, and is currently running as a free quilt along.
The next project I specifically mentioned was the Generations Quilt, for which I wanted to complete one finished quilt!
After many months in a box during the move, I've been able to finish putting together one quilt top for this project, but not to quilt or bind it. And after a meeting with Mom and Grandma, there's a little more applique to add to the quilt top before I start quilting it.
I'm really happy with the progress made so far, but it did fall a little short of the goal I set at the beginning of Summer, so I'll call this a partial success!
The Generations Quilt is based on the traditional Dresden Plate and Six Pointed Star blocks, using templates drafted from extant blocks by Valerie Anne.
Aside from those two specific projects, my remaining goals were a set of guidelines that I hoped would help prevent me from getting distracted and spontaneously chasing after a bunch of new ideas!
The first of these was to limit myself to no more than four ongoing projects!
My crochet afghan and Stitches in Stone quilt were two of these that I worked on throughout the whole season, and there were a few other projects that came and went along the way.
My crochet squares are based on a variety of patterns from Granny Square Flair by Shelley Husband.
I worked on Water Lilies by the Lake and returned the finished row to my guild, tested part of a sampler pattern for a friend, took a two part free motion quilting workshop, pieced my Generations Quilt top, and started working on Lupine and Laughter with my Mom.
My pieced row is based on the Water Lilies by the Lake pattern distributed by the Wee Folks Sewing and Quilt Shoppe.
My sampler quilt is based on a design by Sonja Vandermeer.
The free motion class was taught by Judy Graham at The Quilter's Cupboard.
My Lupine and Laughter quilt is based on a design by Bonnie Hunter of Quiltville.
I don't recall how many of these projects overlapped at a given time, but I do know that I kept this goal in mind throughout the season and chose not to start on certain additional projects because of it, so I will call this one a success!
Another related goal was to not start any brand new projects in the Summer season.
Though some of the projects from my list above may have seemed new when I first introduced them on the blog—I'm thinking specifically about Water Lilies by the Lake and my friend's sampler pattern—I did commit to working on those before the season started.
As a result, I'm calling this goal a success too!
With all of my stitching goals covered, there was one final project I had planned to work on; the sewing studio renovations!
The completion of this goal was largely beyond my control because I don't have the skills or experience to complete a renovation on my own, but I've done my best to help out when I can!
Despite the renovation not being complete yet, we have made a lot of progress on the sewing studio—and on the rest of the house as well—so I'll be calling this a partial success!
Of my seven goals for the Summer season, I was able to complete four and make good progress on the remaining three! That's a way higher success rate than I had expected and I'm really proud of all the work I've done!
Autumn Goals
On that positive note, I'm really looking forward to the upcoming Autumn season and can't wait to share my plans!
A lot of these will be very similar to the goals I made moving into the Summer season since I'm still in the same situation of not having a sewing studio and working on renovating the new house, but some of them will be new!
Let's begin with my normal goals for sharing my work online:
post weekly to the Fibre Arts blog and provide advanced notice of any breaks in that schedule
share updates to my projects on social media, including at least one fun additional post for every blog post announcement
I think I've been getting a lot better at both of these over the last few years, but if you have any suggestions or tips for improving the way I document my work, I would love to learn them!
Moving along to specific projects, I plan to continue working on Generations and Stitches in Stone, but there are also a few other projects that I enjoyed during the Summer months that I'd like to make goals for too!
For Stitches in Stone, I hope to finish typing all of the pattern instructions and piece a sample quilt top
For the Generations Quilt, I would like to completely finish one quilt and have both Mom and Grandma pick blocks for the quilts they will keep for themselves
For my crochet afghan, I would like to have at least a quarter of the afghan in one piece, including resizing squares that need it, adding the sashing, blocking, and joining them together
For Lupine and Laughter, I plan to only work on this quilt with my Mom, meaning that progress may be somewhat sporadic depending on how often we are able to schedule sewing days together
This gives me four specific projects to work on, but I've also been learning a new skill that I need to practice and I think I should include a few general guidelines so I don't end up overwhelming or distracting myself along the way!
The new skill I've been working on is free motion quilting, and the only way to improve a skill like this one is to build up confidence and muscle memory through practice! As such, here's my goal:
fill one practice square with free motion quilting for every day that I do any machine stitching
As for the guidelines I'd like to follow:
I hope to not start any brand new projects until something I'm already working on has been completely finished, with the exception of making guild donations
I plan to limit myself to five or fewer ongoing projects
The five project limit allows me to work on the four aforementioned projects, as well as one other thing at a time.
This gives me space to work on additional projects, like the pattern testing for my friend or the Water Lilies row that I pieced as a donation to one of my quilt guilds!
Finally, we will be continuing to work on renovations into the Autumn season, so I wanted to include a goal for that too:
Continue making progress on sewing studio renovations
Since I'm really not the driving force behind the progress of our renovations, I think last season's goal was a little too optimistic. Instead, I'll continue looking forward to whatever progress we do end up making and to sharing the results with all of you!
Friends, I hope you've had a good start to the Autumn season and were able to enjoy a happy equinox today!
I've really enjoyed taking a look back at the projects and goals I worked on over the Summer months and am excited to see what progress I'll continue to make in the months to come!
If you've been working towards any goals of your own, I would love to hear about your progress! Please share stories and plans in the comments below, by sending me an email, or by reaching out on Instagram!
I'm always so inspired by the creativity of other makers and can't wait to see what all of us will get up to this Autumn season!
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