Can you believe it?!? Today marks the block release date for Week #26 in the Twilight Stars Quilt-Along series! It’s hard to wrap my mind around the fact that we’ve been at this crazy game for six months already, which would also mean that we’re now officially half-way through this exciting year-long project! If you’re on track with the QAL schedule, you should have 50 blocks completed so far, with two more to add to your stack after today. Everyone give a warm welcome to the Twilight Stars block releases for Week #26 – block numbers 16 and 62!

Special thanks and lots of scritches go out to Mr. Hurley, who despite not having the keenest eyesight or the springiest of steps, is the most perfect and lovable block inspector around. Allison Atkinson McCullough is one lucky gal to have such a precious soul keeping her company in her sewing room – AND not to mention, the professional level help with displaying her finished blocks, of course! Thank you for sharing your work and your beautiful grand-pup with us, Allison. Virtual hugs to Hurley and “T-R-E-A-T-S” for you both are on the way!

Got a hankering for a little Scooby snack prize for yourself? You could easily jump on the prize winner band wagon simply by sharing your work with your fellow QAL’ers! All you have to do is post a photo of your completed blocks each week before the release of the next batch, including the required book Triangle Gatherings and Primitive Gatherings Triangle Paper in the picture. Please also include the hashtag #TwilightStarsQAL in your post! Heidi will choose a winner each week until the end of the QAL, which we will announce during my LIVE show on Thursday.

New here? Patterns can be found in my book Triangle Gatherings (required to participate along with a few other items), which can be purchased on the Primitive Gatherings website by clicking HERE. Blocks will be posted every Friday around NOON Central Standard Time, with a correlating blog post shortly after. Block releases can be found both here on the blog and in the “Quilt-Along” area under “Twilight Stars” at http://www.lisabongean.com. Never even heard of Twilight Stars? You can read all about it by clicking HERE. In addition, a full list of details and required supplies can be found at the Twilight Stars Info Page by hitting the button below!

As the weekend rolls in I’m looking forward to spending the last couple days hanging out with all the sweet and wonderful ladies who are here attending the first session of my Naughty or Nice Retreat. We just returned from an afternoon field trip to my favorite antique hot spot, “Ye Old Goat” for some treasure hunting, and then over to Simon’s Specialty Cheese Shop for a little cheese therapy. Both shops are small businesses conveniently located in the city of Appleton, which is only about 20 minutes from PG, give or take. It was a fun little outing and a nice break from being cooped up in stitch-mode for the last few days. We really enjoyed it!

Now that we’re back home at The Gathering for remainder of the day, we’ll take a quick break to grab a snack and reboot before wrapping up class for the week. After that it’s free stitch and sewcial time until lodgers head home on Sunday morning. It’s always sad to see everyone leave after sharing a long retreat together, but we definitely made some great memories – and projects – to take home with us as souvenirs.

Even though this retreat has been a total blast, I’m still looking forward to staying home and putting my feet up on Sunday afternoon. Personally, I could use a few days of downtime so I can rest up before the second session of Naughty or Nice kicks off this Monday. You might have noticed, while I was LIVE earlier in the week that I seemed to have a little bit of a stubborn “frog” taking up residence in my throat. I hate to say it, but this particular frog is proving to be more difficult to get rid of than I thought it would be, and my usual “just ignore it” tactic isn’t really working. On the bright side, other than a scratchy voice and pesky cough, I feel fine overall so I’m hoping some TLC and a few nights in my own bed will be enough to do the trick.

Speaking of wrapping it up, I think that’s my cue to step away from the computer and back over toward The Gathering before people start looking for me. 🙂 I do have one more thing to say before I sign off and that’s, THANK YOU to Kathy E., Charlene W., and Mary Lois H. for leaving comments for me on the blog last week! You know how I love that… You also know what happens next – you get a prize (please check your email for a prize confirmation letter from Heidi. You may also email her at heidin@primitivegatherings.us if you think you are a prize winner)!!!

I will see you all next week for – !!! drum roll please!!! – 2023 Primitive Gatherings 12 Days of Christmas, – which starts this Monday – December 11th, 2023! Be sure to check in with us early Monday morning to see what sort of PG goodies my number one elf Jessica has cooked up for Day 12 of the 12 Days of Christmas at Primitive Gatherings! Plus, mayyybe, just maybe, there might be a pop-up CommentSold between now and the end of the day Monday. Stay tuned! Don’t you just love this time of year? How exciting… And it’s all just getting started! Have a great weekend, everyone. See you soon! ~Lisa