WOOFA and PHD update

What on earth is going on down here?!!

That's what the MOML said when he came down the stairs yesterday afternoon.

Here's why!!

I was in the midst of a sort out :-)

I've set myself some pretty strong goals for the year, signing up with Gail's PHD and Cheryll's WOOFA, and still wanting to do more.
I really felt I needed a sort out so that the projects I want to work on are at the forefront in The Palace and those that are taking a backseat are stored tidily away.

Several hours later I had sorted enough to tidy my brain and my room. I now have clear floor space, I've reorganised a few shelves, and the wardrobe, set up a planning folder, I've reboxed projects and so on.
I have, all in one place, my PHD projects. Here they are all stacked up waiting for a year of creativity and finishes. I discussed all these ones back *here*. There's 12 (gulp) in all.

12 finishes for 2020!!

I've also sorted out my WOOFA projects. As I see it, these are the list of projects I want to work on, but I'm not necessarily aiming to finish them. Accordingly I've made a separate list for these items. The PHD list is Must-DOs as far as finishing; the WOOFA list, I'm not aiming quite as high. (I hope that's acceptable, Cheryll.)

Wouldn't be be great though if they were all finished as well!

I have 6 projects on this list —
Pieces of Time —

This wasn't even on my radar but Joanne put it on her list. As we both started ours at the same time, I thought I should pull it out!

Not even a Mouse —

Row By Row quilt —

Country At Heart —

Flash Cat Medallion —

I haven't really blogged about this yet but that will wait for another day!

Omigosh quilt —

Such a long term project. But as I love making the blocks, I don't want this to fall by the wayside. And I want an excuse to sew them, when I clearly have other projects on my list!

Believe it or not, I have a fair few projects that need attention and I am hoping that my approach this year will help me to refine that list. I'm listing both lists on my sidebar.

I must do a sing out to Yvonne of Quilting Jetgirl who organised the 2020 planning party which I linked up to in December. The process, although incomplete, really got me thinking and planning. She also arranged for some sponsorship for the planning party and I'm thrilled to be the winner (randomly selected) of the Aurifil collection prize! As Aurifil is a thread I already enjoy using, I'm very happy about that! Thanks Yvonne, and thanks Aurifil!

Okay, that's enough list making and tidying to make my head ring :-) I'm off now to sew-sew-sew ♥

'til next time,

happy stitches,

PHD 2020 list

As part of my planning for this year, I committed to Gail's PHD in 2020..

Yes, I'd like to get 12 Projects Half Done finished this year and Yes, I'd like to finish everything I start this year!
Tall orders.
Here is the list of 12 UFOs I would like to finish. Some are old and some are relatively new, all in varying stages of completion.

Without further ado —
Hannah and Harrington - I completed the top in 2013 and this is what I said back then....I'm very much in love with this project and I'm hoping it won't be long until it's quilted and turned into a real quilt!  HAHA!  (Forever the optimist.)
This was a quiltalong by Michelle of The Raspberry Rabbits.

This will be its year (it's actually already basted, ready to quilt) —

The MOML's jelly roll quilt - another one dating back a few years. I finished this top in 2014. It is actually partially quilted but I got stuck with what to do next —

This Mystery Stitchery quilt came back onto my radar recently when it was being used for a spot of hunt making, and I realised that it needed more quilting. It has some very basic ditch quilting and I think it will be more robust if I re-visit it - even if it's only with some more ditch stitching! Oh and it needs a label :-) Originally finished in 2010!

Friday's Garden  - this is another partially quilted one. Once again I stumbled with the quilting.... I'm doing a fill I'm not happy with and I need to decide whether to rip it out or continue on. I know what my heart wants me to do but I have yet to decide if I can be bothered!! I last worked on this quite recently - back in 2018 and I do love this quilt so I must get it finished —

So that's four that I just have to finish the quilting on. 

The Mod Bear's Paw needs an outer border (some piecing involved) then it too will need quilting. This was a sewalong on Lorna's Sew Fresh Quilts blog back in 2016. This is another quilt that I absolutely love —

International Sisters. I put a lot of energy into this last year but regrettably put it away in preparation for my USA trip in November. I'm really keen to get it sashed and finished as I love it so much (haha it seems I love all my projects!). This project started with a block shared by Preeti of Sew Preeti which a few of us have taken off with —

Birds on a Wire is a project which needs a lot more work on it. These are blocks that I made when pattern testing for Juliet of Tartankiwi in 2018. I have a plan of what I'm dong with them... I just need to execute that plan!

One of my goals for the year is to use more of my scraps. Accordingly, my Great Granny squares will be pulled out again. I have 9 blocks made, and had decided to continue on and make another 7 for a 4x4 grid. We'll see. (I used the tutorial from Lori Holt's blog *here*.) 

 And the other scrap quilt I want to finish up is my Scrappy Sprouts. I have a pile of these but I do need to sort through them and decide what colours, etc, I need to use for balance. I think I may be about halfway through this project.

I have a wee pile of Christmas quilts I'd love to make but as I'm partway through this one, I won't let myself start anything new. This is Snowflake Land from Quiltmania#80. I haven't worked on this since 2016. Not a big project and I think I have only two more blocks to do. No excuses really.

Numbers 11 and 12 on my PHD list are a bit wishy-washy. Inspired by Janice's recent post *here*, I aim to take two orphan blocks and finish them off. I don't have many projects that I've mentally abandoned, (I still love them all!) but there is the odd block that can do with attention. 

Below are some possible candidates for this —

So there we have it, my list of 12 projects that I am wanting to completely finish this year. Wow, it's a little daunting but like the elephant, I will break it down into small pieces and work my way through them. 

The next step is to actually pull out all these items (rather than finding previously taken photos on my blog!) and store them in sight. 

Thank you Gail of the Quilting Gail blog for motivating and pushing me to do this thinking and planning. Hopefully what follows is a year of finishing!

'til next time,

happy stitches,

A Word or more and a OMG

I thought I would spend today happily sewing away but in my early morning ponderings I realised I really wanted to put some more thought into my yearly planning instead.
It's been very disappointing to me that I haven't started or finished all the millions of quilts (maybe that's an exaggeration, make it hundreds) that I would have liked to over the last couple of years. My first 2020 planning post highlights how important it is to me to be a little more productive.
I know, I do lead a busy life (as many of us do!)  and I wouldn't miss out on anything else that I do for anything.
Believe it or not, I do actually enjoy doing this —

And wouldn't swap times like this either —

So instead I need to put some thought into how I'm going to achieve as least some of what I want to achieve.

A lot of people have been posting and sharing their word of the year lately;  a word to guide them in this year's sewing. I haven't felt the urge to do one before but I'm feeling like I need one this year.

Haha the silly thing is that I'm having trouble narrowing it down to just one word.

I have three.

They're sort of all related so I'm going to go with them all!

Plan I need to plan my time better, think ahead, prepare better, plan for the interruptions.
Focus Focus on my goals, focus (concentrate) on what I'm doing (already while writing this I've jumped up to stick a photo I just found to the wall. I'm good at getting distracted).
Play To me playing is just enjoying what I'm doing, but of course it's a very important aspect. To keep my creative soul happy I need to have the freedom to play as it suits me. Play keeps the excitement there. It might be my current project, it might be a completely spontaneous sew session, to experiment, learn a new technique or jump on board the bandwagon when I see other friends doing something cool.
If I plan and focus efficiently I'm setting myself up to both meet my goals and play at the same time.
That's the theory anyway.
Next to display these words somewhere so they will guide my year.

👏

(See how I fiddle and lose focus. Now I've just discovered I can insert emojis in my blogpost!)

And now for my One Monthly Goal for January. I'm delighted to see that Patty of Elm Street Quilts is running this for us again in 2020.

There have been a few babies born over the last little while that I haven't made for. And I'd really like to do that.
A good friend of both my daughters had a wee boy in December.

I've had a think about the design and colourway for his quilt. Above is my initial fabric pull from what I have on hand but will top it up with some more childlike fabric at my lqs next time I go in.
My number one aim is for the top to be pieced by the end of the month but I'd really like to think it can be quilted and delivered as well.
With some planning and focusing, I'm sure this can happen. And I think I'll enjoy the process too😃
Patty's link-up is *here* if you'd like to join in too.

'til next time,

Happy stitches,

Looking ahead to 2020

Yvonne at Quilting Jetgirl is hosting a 2020 Planning Party.
I thought I'd join in, and then I thought I wouldn't but now I've decided I will!
Planning for the new year is something that I've done in the past with limited success. One thing I do quite well is write a post in January and then never really thought about it again!!
But I'm thinking that, at least if I join the planning party, it's a start with trying to focus, prioritise and putting ideas into words.
It's a springboard for further thought, a little more accountability than if I do nothing!

At the start of 2019 I drew up a simple mind map that included the important things I wanted or needed to work on. It included things I'd committed to financially (particularly those things that have a bigger outlay) as well as other wants and needs for the year. Being a good size, visual and right next to my desk, I found it a useful piece of paper. I did actually refer to it often and I did actually double check it when I was finishing a project or starting something new.
It wasn't necessarily something I stuck to, and everything on it wasn't necessarily made/finished/etc but it was a useful tool.

So I'm going to do that again - I've got the start of a chart and will add to it as I get myself sorted.

Gosh my planning has barely started but it's getting full already!

I'm very good at getting my projects to a certain stage, putting them aside to come back to but not doing so. With that in mind I've signed up to two year-long parties for finishing projects. By doing this I hope to have some extra motivation and answerability which may help me meet some of my goals. A bit of cheering on from the sidelines never goes amiss either :-)
The first sign up —

Cheryll of Stitching Cubbyhole has issued a WOOFA challenge (Working On or Finishing A UFO).
For this, Cheryll is making a -list of projects to work on ... or even better... finish during 2020 (to quote her words).
So I'll be adding her WOOFA button and a list of projects/ufos to my sidebar when I get a chance.

And the second sign up —

Quilting Gail is running the PHD project in 2020.
I'm going to accept this challenge as well. It would be amazing to achieve my PHD in 2020!
(Where PHD stands for Projects Half Done.)
How does this one work?
To quote Gail -

We finish UFOs and we FINISH all projects that we start in 2020. We finish what we start so that the UFO list does not increase! (And, gulp, we have to list at least 12 of those projects.)So this is a pretty tough challenge but, if I can pull it off,  it will be most beneficial!

Plenty to think about, and to add to this year's mindmap.Scrap Invasion —I sewed a lot of small scraps this year and made more blocks for my Omigosh quilt. Because it takes 1" strips/squares, it doesn't use up a lot of scraps.

I love making these but they don't use enough scraps fast enough!

And my scrap bins are overflowing, I cant walk past a lonely scrap without scooping it up and putting it in a (scrap) bin. This coming year I need to re-join Angela and the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. I love some of the quilts made where participants have sewn the same block all year e.g check out Sally of Objects of Design and her Piglet Mayhem quilt. Preeti did the same with her International Sisters quilt blocks. So I'm thinking I'd like to do something like this with my scraps in 2020. Watch this space :-)
The above plans make me seem very virtuous. While I will be busy meeting my goals (I hope!), I do know there will be the odd DREAMi and Squirrel moment. I love the regular linky Sandra of mmmquilts does.

This celebrates those - ahem - moments we have where we have to drop everything and start something new. As this happens to me, I'm sure I'll be linking up too. 

I think this is enough thinking for now. I need to make my lists for the WOOFA challenge and PHD work.

Just to finish, I looked after two small children today. I was very happy to see the beanbags I made them for Christmas in use!

'til next time (on this 30th day of continuous blogging!),

happy stitches,