Hi ,

School is out, and here in NC we're already headed full swing into another summer filled with swimming, camping, raising chickens, and of course quilting!

With our little boy James out of school and summer camp starting next week, we decided to camp out last night in our yard. Read all about our camping trip, as well as more renovations to my studio and some new pictures of Duchess Reigns, right here.

Do you struggle with finding the time to quilt during this time of the year? Of course I know many of you are busy gardening right now, and I definitely love a homegrown juicy beef steak tomato myself! Despite the longer days full of sunshine (or rain) it always seems like there is less time in the summer for quilting. This week I shared details about my daily routine which has helped me form great habits for quilting on a daily basis, no matter what time of the year it is!

One project I squeezed into this week was making this stepping stone with words from the book The Happiness Project which ring true for me every day: The days are long, but the years are short.

This quote is most especially ringing true for this time of the year. The days are so long, but this summer is going to fly by faster than blinking. Every time I see this stepping stone it makes me smile and reminds me to make every day count.

Now enough about routines and camping, let's catch up on a brand new design!

This design worked great in the Earth section of Express Your Love. You can click here to learn how to quilt Cobblestones and see how I dealt with a tricky fabric issue at the same time!

By the way, have you downloaded the free pattern for this quilt yet? You can download it right here at any time for free and join in on the project! I'll be starting 2 new versions of this quilt in July, so this is a great time to print this design, tape the pages together, and begin pulling fabrics for this fun project!

I've been quilting since 2005 and since my very first quilt I've been a pin baster and loved using safety pins. I felt like they were the absolute best way to baste a quilt securely, but they always had a very serious flaw - they always tore up my hands while basting and were tricky to remove from the quilt while quilting.

I can't count the number of times I accidentally stitched INTO a safety pin only to break my thread, my needle, and make a big mess of my quilt all at the same time. Talk about annoying!

This is the reason why I now use Pinmoors. These little silicone nuggets cap the end of straight pins allowing you to baste a quilt easily without tearing up your hands.

Even better, Pinmoors are very easy to take out while you are quilting. The bright colors are easy to spot on your quilt so you won't accidentally stitch too close and they're so easy to take off: all you have to do is tug on the needle and the Pinmoor pops right off!

You can find packs of 100 Pinmoors right here in the Day Style Designs Quilt Shop!

That's it for this week! I'm headed down to the sewing room to start planning the two new versions of Express Your Love for later this summer. I'm thinking of all the bins of fabric I've just organized and wondering if a scrappy goddess might be in my future!

Let's go quilt,

Leah Day