2019 Goals and Challenges

Hello Friends!

Oh how I have missed you all.  Thank you for sticking with me.  My last post was sad and a long time ago.  I was lost for a few months in there.  I was always running for Dad and then it just stopped.  He was gone and I didn't know what to do with myself.  My Mom still had dialysis on Saturdays and they were long, lonely days.  My sister has been a big help and we were alternating weekends.  Mom now does dialysis MWF so my sister and I still alternate Saturdays but it's just to take her shopping and not a whole long day.
I am a member of the Madison Modern Quilt Guild.  In November I decided to go to the meeting.  They have been hard for me lately.  Partly due to living farther from the shop and just not feeling myself.  Well, this meeting was different for me.  I didn't stay for the whole meeting because I have a hard time driving in the dark.  More scared of deer than anything else.  I saw a few of my friends there and they let me cry and talk and just were there for me.  I felt instantly rejuvenated.  I was telling my friend about it and she asked me what changed?  Me.  I changed.  I felt a purpose again.  I felt a need to get my feelings out and be more creative.  Quilting is my outlet.  I have missed it.  My friends showed me that.  I think they missed me too.
So now I am back to creating! 
I should have warned you in the beginning this was a long post.  I had planned to show you everything I have done since the last time I was here, but I think I will stretch it out.  This post will be about goals and challenges.
I am taking on challenges because I like that term better than resolutions.  Everything we do is a process.  The following challenges are going to be worked on this year:

• eat better and walk more
• Vintage Christmas Quilt with my friend Marilyn
• Project Quilting season 10-starts January 6
• Read Like a Pirate 2019 book club-find on Facebook
• completely finish a quilt a month
• reconnect and make more time for friends
• bullet journal

I received an air fryer and an instapot for Christmas.  I am determined to plan and eat better.

I have the Quilter's Planner and my friend Marilyn and I are making the Vintage Christmas Quilt.  There are 42 blocks in the quilt.  We are making a block a week.   I plan to start all of these on a Sunday.  May will be a difficult month though.  Every Sunday is booked and most of the month too. My birthday, Mother's Day, my son graduates from college and I will be in England for the last Sunday.  But I will push through and either make ahead or catch up when I get back.  The planner has been a great tool to help me organize the blocks.  You can get your copy here.

 

Project Quilting season 10 starts Jan 6.  You can find the info for that here.

Won't you play along?

 

Read like a pirate has been created by my friend Trisha.  You can find it on Facebook and join.  I was going to set a goal of 12 books this year but I think that is too lofty.  I only have a little bit of time daily to read so I kept my goal low at 6.  Maybe I will read more than that, we shall see.

 

I am challenging myself to finish a quilt a month.  Now before you panic and wonder how I will accomplish this, just know that I have many quilt tops made.  They just need quilting and binding.  I am hoping to learn the long arm from my friend this year.  I think this is completely doable.

This is a blurry picture but you get the idea.  When my Dad passed I was cleaning out the closet and found all of his flannel shirts.  I was bagging them for donation when a voice told me that was free fabric!  I decided to make a flannel quilt from his shirts.  I ended up with enough fabric to make 3 quilts.  My sister, brother and Aunt will all receive a quilt.  All 3 are pieced and 1 is basted.  I will just quilt them on my domestic machine.  I am just doing straight line quilting on them.  So I feel pretty confident that I will be able to do the 12 quilts this year.

I bought a bullet journal last year and barely touched it.  This year, I have already filled many pages.  It's a good outlet when the sewing things are put away.

I don't really know if these things will get accomplished, but I am going to try my hardest to get things done.  I have lots of quilts to make so I would like to finish some before I start more.  Too bad there are only 7 days in the week and I have to go to work 5 of those days.  Got to pay for the fabric somehow.

How do you start the new year?  Do you make resolutions?  Do you follow through and complete them?  How do you stay on task and organized.  I would love to hear how you all do that.

So I think this is long enough.  I have lots more to share with you.  I have been quilting and making other things.  Stay tuned.

Blessings
Amy