Best of 2016

Time to review 2016! Let's start with the top blog posts of the year and link up with my friend Cheryl of Meadow Mist Designs and the Best of 2016 Linky Party.

I chose my top blog posts of 2016 by the number of page views. Here we go:

#5 Reverse Sawtooth Star
This was a fun quilt that I made from my Anna Maria Horner stash using almost all leftover pieces from other quilts.

#4 Bourbon Street
This was also a stash busting quilt, but turned out so pretty with many of my favorite little scraps of fabric.

#3 Scrappy Trip
I shared how I created my variation of the web phenomenon, Scrappy Trip Around the World quilt.

#2 Squash Blossom
After searching and searching for a pattern for this block, I drafted my own and shared the pattern.

#1 Tumbling Spools
This wallhanging was a variation of the quilt featured on Moda bake Shop several years ago and turned out so pretty in Handmade by Bonnie and Camille.

I got the most comments (107) on 2 posts, where I shared my thoughts on blogging and how it's changed over the last couple of years. Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts on that as well!

Right up there with the number of views was a Photography series that my daughter posted here on my blog. There you can find some really good tips for photographing your quilts: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

And the final stats? This year I completed 19 quilts and 4 wall quilts. You can go back through the blog to see most of them. My most recent finish has yet to be photographed, so watch for that soon.

I made 2 quilts that never made it to the blog. Not sure why, they definitely weren't my favorites, but certainly deserve to be noticed.

The first is a Swiss quilt, pattern from Thimbleblossoms. Since I always have lots of aqua fabric, I thought it would be a good pattern to use up some smaller leftover pieces.

This quilt doesn't have a name because it was a design as you go quilt. I used a stack of Cotton and Steel, made some big half square triangles and then just arranged them and sewed them together. I followed with some simple straight line quilting.

I've really made an effort this year to reduce my stash. Believe me I still have plenty of fabric, but it was feeling overwhelming at the beginning of the year. I find with too much, I lose track of what I have. Besides sewing it up, I sold some really nice bundles on Instagram and donated several bags of fabric for charity quilts. I'm definitely feeling better about what I have and this next year I'd like to be better at using my favorites rather than "saving" them.

Just this week, I pulled out some Maze and Vale fabric {hand printed in Australia and super expensive, but loved by me} that I've been so afraid to cut into and made a simple patchwork pillow. Now I get to look at it every day!

I've also been hoarding this piece of Liberty of London fabric that I bought at Pearl Soho in New York City in 2014. I ended up make a Petal Pouch and I just love how it turned out!

So that's a wrap for 2016. Thanks for hanging in there with me for this long post.

And thank you, thank you, thank you for being here throughout the year. I'm so grateful for this Internet thing that allows us to share, converse and simply hang out together. I'll be thinking this weekend about what I'd like to make in 2017...

Handmade journal from Plum Umbrella on Etsy

How about you? Any quilting goals for the new year?

Wishing you a wonderful, happy and quilty 2017!!!