Week 4: Advice, Calendar, a Link Up, and a Giveaway

Seriously, week 4???

Today's advice for new bloggers is from Lynne of Lily's Quilts.  If Lily's Quilts is not already on your inspiration blogroll, I highly recommend it - she makes beautiful quilts and has several great tutorials.  And Lynne's blog also holds a special place in my blogging heart and I think many of yours as well for her monthly Small Blog Meet.  It is the first of every month and is a place for blogs with under 50 readers to link up and meet other small bloggers.  This is how I met many of the new bloggers in the hop including many of my best blogging friends - you know who you are!  Click here to read her advice for us.

Week 4 Calendar:

June 12
    Kelly from Jeliquilts 

    Yzo from Chez Roo
June 14

    Debbie from A Quilter's Table

    Sarah from Silly Banana Sewing

Awesome Events hosted by Blog Hoppers - Check them out!

    Alyssa from Pile O Fabric  - Quilting and Sewing Events 101

    Debbie from A Quilter's Table  - Tuesdays at the Summer's Table

    May from Confessions of a Fabraholic - Star of Africa Quilting Bee

    Danny from MommyFor Reals - asking for help making pillows for Teen Reach Adventure Camp

    Rebecca from Sew Festive Handmade - Christmas in July

    Em from Sewing by Moonlight - Road Trip Quilt A Long

    Catherine from Knotted Cotton - Fabric Trading
    Lorelei from Mermaid Sews - Quilting for Kids in Need

Click here to find links to the awesome tutorials from the last three weeks and more information on joining the Blog Hop.

Other ways to keep up and participate in the Blog Hop:

   1.  Follow me on Twitter. 

   2.  Join and post on the Let's Get Acquainted! Flickr Group

   3.  Follow and post on my Let's Get Acquainted! Pinterest Boards here and here.

What is this - a new button???  Well, since we are learning all these great tips from the bloggers in the advice series, here is my motivation to put those tips and ideas into action.  Each week I'll pick one or two items to highlight here.  If you have any ideas you'd like to see, let me know.  Or if you'd like to host a Let's Figure it out Together post on your blog, that would be great too.  Topics:  setting up social media for our blogs, blog design (adding buttons, pages, headers, post dividers, backgrounds, and more), and photography among others that come up along the way.

For this week:
1.  Let's all be 100% positive that we are NOT a No-Reply Blogger.  Here are some tutorials here and here.  Interestingly, it was Lynne from Lily's Quilts who let me know I was a no-reply blogger when I first linked up to the small blog meet.

2.  Join Twitter.  Why?

• great way to promote your blog posts
• find out about special fabric sales and promotions
• keep up with your favorite bloggers
• communicate with your followers when you don't want to publish a whole post
• retweets - share great posts written by you or others with your followers who can share with their followers who can share with their followers  . . .

As with everything blog hop related, this is open to all bloggers with stops on the hop and any of our readers AND no rules - no pressure to participate - totally up to you how little or how much you want to get involved with this.

If you would like to participate, confirm that you are a blogger that can receive replies to your comments and set up a Twitter account.  You can follow me on Twitter here (I'll be sure to follow you back) and then you can use this week's link up to let us know you are on twitter - just put Twitter:  your blog or twitter name (in addition to linking up your post.)  Next week:  Flickr.

And how about a great giveaway.  Julie from The Intrepid Thread is very generously hosting a giveaway for a fat quarter bundle of Flying Free by Adrianne Looman for Anthology - isn't it beautiful?  This line is among many of the new fabrics she carries including several at the top of my wish list.

To enter, all you need to do is leave a comment on this post.  Leave any comment you want to enter but if you'd like a topic, how about your suggestions for topics for the Let's Figure It out Together posts.  One comment per person for an entry (replies to other comments don't count so reply all you want!)  The giveaway will be open until Friday, June 15th at 8pm EDT and a winner will be chosen at random.  And, PLEASE, leave an email unless you are sure that you are not a no-reply blogger.  The winner will be announced in the Week 5 Blog Hop News on Monday, June 18th.  

Last week's winner of the premade blog design by Jennie from Clover and Violet is LeslieJune 4, 2012 2:31 PM who said:  "Wonderful words of advice, I especially love the line about bribing ::giggle::"

Anyone participating in or following along with the blog hop can add a link.  Please either post the button or a text link somewhere in your post or on your blog and please visit (at the very least) the person who links up right before you and leave a comment!