I am speechless!

As some of you probably know, I have organized a "little" blog hop the past two years. A few months after I started this blog, I timidly emailed some of my new online friends who were also new bloggers to see if they might be interested in a blog hop for new quilt bloggers. If I remember correctly, everyone I contacted responded with an enthusiastic "yes!" What I had originally thought would be a short hop with 10 or so bloggers grew into a 6 month blog hop with almost 100 stops. At some point, I realized that we had to cap the numbers and we had a final blog hop week for the Let's Get Acquainted New Blogger Blog Hop in October of 2012.

In May of 2013, after much deliberation, I decided to organize another blog hop for new bloggers. Again, the response was overwhelming. For 2013, I decided to make it a bit more manageable for everyone by limiting the hop to the first 75 bloggers to respond and scheduling more bloggers per week so that the hop would only last two months.

So, what does all of this have to do with the photos? Well, late last week, I received a package from my friend Em from Sewing by Moonlight. I couldn't imagine what she was sending me - and here is where the speechless part comes in - it was this quilt made by the bloggers from the 2013 Let's Get Acquainted Blog Hop for New Bloggers!!! Wow!!!

This quilt is filled with blocks from all over the world, I mean, seriously, all over the world! Every single block in this quilt is beautiful and special - while I don't think I can match every block to the blogger who made it, I think I would guess right for several of them! The blocks were pieced together and quilted by Em (who will be posting more about the quilt soon.) Again, wow! For the back, she spelled out "Let's Get Acquainted 2013" in paper pieced blocks and then there are blocks with notes and signatures from everyone who contributed. Okay, one more time - wow!!! I really am speechless. I had absolutely no idea that they (you) were planning this.

So, to any of you 2013 blog hop people who are reading this post - Thank you for this beautiful quilt. I will treasure it always! What a fantastic and special way to remember the fun we had this year. I am so happy to have "met" each and everyone of you.