First, the evidence (sort of in order, but not perfectly) that I did accomplish some things this year:
So, a lot more than it felt like! I felt like I was swimming upstream most of the year, but it’s nice to see it all laid out like this.
It was a year of new hair and new knees, and the loss of two family members. Sometimes it was all I could do to keep up with the house and garden, let alone sewing. It was a year when I really appreciated the blogging community, and the Twilters (Facebook and Twitter), and Twitter in general. It was a …memorable… election year. We’ll get through this together. And we’ll sew a lot.
This month:
December Goals
- Revamp fireplace screen cover. Yes! Not including a picture because it looks much the same, but it is much improved, fits better, has much more quilting.
- Work on Scrappy Stars Around the Corner. No. I did not get to this.
- Make donation pillow cases. Yes! I made twelve.
- Make December blocks for Kat (?) Yes! Well, no, I didn’t need to make any, because it turned out that it was a Nov./Dec. challenge, and I had sent mine in November.
- Pull scraps for Charlotte’s new mystery quilt. No, but I decided on my background color, a raspberry solid.
Bonus: I made two Maple Leaf quilts for donation.
This year:
- I will complete the large UFO quilt under my cutting table. It reminds me constantly that I abandoned it, so it takes up mental space. It also hogs most of the space under my cutting table, and is visual clutter in the room. First, I need to spread it out and come up with a better quilting plan than I had before. Then I need to mark, baste, and trim the batting on the back for faux trapunto. Then I can quilt it, etc. No, I did not do this. I just wasn’t feeling it. I did get an idea about cutting it down, since I hate how large it turned out.
- I will give my studio a good cleaning. It needs dusting, a little scrubbing, and the elimination of lots of extra stuff that has accumulated there. I also need to donate pillow cases and the baby quilts that haven’t sold. Yes! I did all those things. And hung a picture.
- I want to try to take another fifty yards out of my stash. This won’t be easy, because in the past four years I’ve gotten rid of 350 yards. There’s still some
uglyless appealing fabric that I want to use up and partially replace with fresh stuff. One area that I can reduce is the scraps. I will continue to use them for quilts and donation blocks. I’m cutting soon for this year’s Scrapitude quilt, and Alycia and Kat have monthly blog drives for scrap blocks for good causes (Kat is taking January off). Yes! I just barely made it, but I did. And that’s without finishing Scrappy Stars Around the Corner!
A pretty good month and a pretty good year, sewing-wise. In the next few days I’ll decide on goals for 2017 and post them here. It really does help organize things for me and helps me remember them!
I’ve enjoyed reading your year-end posts. Happy New Year to all of you! Stay safe and healthy! See you next year!
My last quilts for this year were these twin Maple Leaf quilts for donation to
I didn’t piece these six-inch maple leaves, they’re from a top I brought home that my mother had pieced. I knew she’d be glad for it to go to a good cause. I was just going to add some borders and call it done, but it was already 48″ by 60″. This drive is looking for really small quilts (36″ x 50″ or so), so I took the top apart in the middle and made it into two quilts. These each finished at 40″ x 62″.
I quilted between all the blocks first with the walking foot and fine thread, so they have more quilting than might appear. On one I quilted straight lines through the leaves and feathers through the blank spaces, edge to edge.
On the other, I quilted wavy lines to suggest wind, and then a feather border.
My other finish this week is twelve pillowcases (here are six) to donate to 
Evening in the Garden Quilts 