New Beginnings

I've been a follower of Ali Edwards for a very long time, and have chosen a One Little Word for the past five years or so. This year I signed up for her workshop and have been contemplating my Word for about three weeks. I was looking for a word that went beyond making plans and having big ideas, and instead focused on action to actually get things done. I tossed around ideas like Act, Strive, Action, Complete, Create, Produce, etc. All these were variations on a great theme, but none really felt like what I was aiming for.

Then over the weekend, I was browsing through a thesaurus online and enjoying my morning coffee, still not finding anything that really felt right, when my 7 month old got hungry. I started nursing him and browsed some more on my phone, and his little hand started grasping for my screen. I moved the phone away and glanced down at him, told him he was a silly monkey and too young for a phone, then browsed some more. He reached up again, and this time when I looked at him, I actually *looked* at him, and when my eyes met his he lit up like the sun! The sweet smile on his face was like a bolt of lightening through the cloud of overwhelm I was feeling! I put down the phone and gazed at him as he continued to nurse, and I had my epiphany. I was so focused on accomplishing my crazy To Do list, that I lost focus of *why* I wanted to get things done!

For many years I have had wall art in my studio that says "You cannot do everything at once, but you can do Some thing, at once." It was set aside in the shuffle of moving my studio and was never put back up. Coupled with that, I have long included "Do One Thing" on my weekend chores checklist, so that I pick some niggling little task from my list that needs to be done, and it usually takes ten minutes or less! Why I procrastinate on these things, I'll never know! It does the job, though, every weekend I do one thing that I would otherwise have ignored. After all, it's just one tiny thing, not some huge commitment, right?

All of that background noise distilled into a clear thought while I nursed my little guy. I thought to myself, "Don't lose sight of what is truly important. Be here, in this moment, because he won't care if the house is clean or if you have a stack of UFO's waiting to be finished. Focus on this one moment, and enjoy it fully, because you cannot get it back! Do one thing at a time, and do it to the best of your ability!"

There it was again: Do One Thing. Just one, that isn't too difficult. Anyone can do One thing, but EVERYTHING starts with One thing!! And there it was, flashing neon couldn't have made it more obvious: my One Little Word was just that. One.

Ali encourages words that have multiple meanings, giving more opportunity to apply your word to your entire life. In my case, One applies to so many aspects if my life, it's like an entire paragraph of OLW's!

Get up and do One thing on your To Do list.
Take One step to make progress toward my goals.
Do One thing at a time.
Make wise food choices for One day.
Purge One drawer/box/thing right now.
Sew One block together.
Finish One project.
Post One thing on Etsy.
Buy the supplies for One project. The supplies can live at the store until that project is done!

We all know about how once were moving, momentum comes into play, so I doubt that One thing will stay only one thing! But it's a commitment-free place to start, and the start is what I really need! So here's to 2015, the year if One, it will be amazing!!

Monday Progress Report

I actually had a pretty productive weekend!  Most of my Done items were completed on or Errands run on Friday

Fun:
Visit my LQS to pick up the fabric kits for the two BOM clubs I am in - Check!
Finish the quilting on the January BOM (need thread) - Bought thread, but didn't finish
Begin cutting squares for the baby quilt I have planned - Got a little caught up in organizing!
Dinner out with the Hubs - Check!
 

Done:
Bring 2 boxes to Goodwill - Check!
Bring computer detritus to Best Buy for their E-cycling program - Check!
Go to the bank - Check!
Finish organizing my fabric (need more comic book boards) - Check!

Something else I managed to get done this weekend was to actually do the quilting on my UFO for this month!  Next, I'll dig through my stash to see if I have scraps for binding without cutting into any more yardage!

Happy Sewing!

Finish It Friday

Aby over at Simplify101 does a weekly post called Finish It Friday, where she lists the Fun and Done things she intends to accomplish over the weekend. Since I'm focusing on Progress this year, I've decided to join in the fun!

Fun:
Visit my LQS to pick up the fabric kits for the two BOM clubs I am in
Finish the quilting on the January BOM (need thread)
Begin cutting squares for the baby quilt I have planned
Dinner out with the Hubs

Done:
Bring 2 boxes to Goodwill
Bring computer detritus to Best Buy for their E-cycling program
Go to the bank
Finish organizing my fabric (need more comic book boards)

These will all be SO nice go check off my To Do list, I'm actually looking forward to spending all day running around town!

Happy Sewing!

Fabric Organizing!

Oh I am in LOVE with Comic Book Boards!  There's a ton of chatter online about using them to organize your fabrics, and I finally conned my sweet hubby into picking a package up for me when he went to town.  Needless to say, I had quite a bit of fun!

Unfortunately, I also realized that I have WAY more fabric than I thought I did!  Who knew I'd need a second package of boards! I think my yardage multiplied in the dark while I wasn't paying attention!

Happy Sewing!

Stars in my eyes!

I managed to finish my fabric stars this week, and WOW they seemed to take forever!  Now I just need to mail them off to the recipients!

Oh these were a blast to make! I was able to iron all the strips in batches, then do the folding while watching TV in the evenings.  Now that they're done, I need to come up with a new handwork project!

Happy Sewing!

Sunny, Sleepy Sunday

Today was one of those days where everything sorta fell into place. We managed to sleep until nearly 8:00, puttered around and made some excellent progress on a few projects, and managed to take an hour and a half long nap! I woke up and the whole house smells like the roast cooking in the crock pot, the sun is at the perfect angle to stream into my window, and I still have a few more hours to be productive! I haven't done much sewing this weekend, but I did get the strips for the rest of my stars ironed and have been working on them during the football games. I also got four bins of baby clothes down to two, so I'm *this* close to seeing my quilting frame again in the basement!

I've been making myself work on the baby clothes a tiny bit at a time to make the whole project less daunting. Normally I'd put it off for so long that I'd HAVE to do it all at once; this time my goal for the day is to only bring up one size worth and sort it into tops, bottoms, and pj's. Then the next day's project is to fold them and purge out the extras. Yeah, it took over a week, but now I'm more than halfway through and feel like I can finish easily! It's all about Progress, remember?

Speaking of Progress, I had a pretty frank conversation with a girlfriend last week. I'm not sure how we got onto the subject, but we were talking about leaving our "collections" behind if something happened to us, be it a collection of 5000 gingerbread men, shoes, or fabric! Since it wasn't something that *we* were passionate about personally, that it would be easier to give the collection away rather than store it or try to find the time to sell it. Being surrounded with items someone else loved would be pretty overwhelming and may even slow the grieving process. My point to the story? She told me all my fabric would go to Goodwill!! My first thought was "Ouch, harsh!!" But then she reminded me that finished quilts were a different story entirely, and that those would be cherished! Wow, did that ever get me thinking. So much of the fabric I've purchased is intended as gifts for people I care about, and it doesn't express my love when it's just languishing in my stash! I would hate for my legacy to be a huge pile of unsewn fabric destined for the donation bin; I'd much rather have people remember me 20 years from now snuggling under a quilt I made!

So tomorrow I plan on doing an inventory of the precuts I have in my stash, since those are the inspiration behind all the quilts I plan on making. I put myself on a fabric diet as of the first of the year, with the intention of using up some of my precuts. I'm allowing myself to buy borders, backing, and backgrounds, but NO focal fabrics! I rarely buy yardage just because, although I've picked up a few fabrics on clearance that I saw a lot of potential in. My weakness is M*QC's Daily Deal and their great prices on precuts! There's just something about all that variety in a fun, coordinated little package that is so hard for me to resist! So, with an inventory in hand, I'll have a better motivational tool to keep me on track! Hmmm, maybe I should do one of all the kits I've purchased, too... I may never buy fabric again!!

Happy Sewing!

Welcome 2013!

Today was the QOV New Year's Day Sit & Sew, where the goal was to devote a day of sewing to making a quilt for a service member. I made some pretty good progress, given some unexpected (and EARLY!) company this morning and the fact that we're all fighting a pretty nasty cold!  I bought fabric for this project in the early summer, and it has lived in the plastic bag I brought it home in ever since. It's listed as one of my 2013 UFO's, even though technically it's a New-FO. This pattern goes together pretty quickly, once you've pressed and squared all the HST's (half-square triangles.) I like this pattern so much I've actually purchased fabric to make it in several different styles! I can think of four more just off the top of my head, that's a little embarrassing!

I didn't get the cutting done ahead of schedule like I'd planned so I could devote the entire day to sewing; my work schedule has been pretty full with the holidays. This portion has a sawtooth border of another 40 HST's, and I'm still in the process of squaring those blocks up. I've never done a QOV before, so I'm not sure what they expect for the quilting portion. I think I'll send this to a volunteer long armer instead of doing it on my own, I want to make sure my idea of "quilting" is acceptable!

In other news, our hostess drew #5 as the random number for the 2013 UFO's, so this month I will be quilting and binding my Koi Quilt! When I was cleaning my sewing room and gathering all the UFO's in my stash, I kept looking at this one and hoping it would be chosen soon! It's getting mighty cold out there and it will be nice to snuggle under while watching movies. Of course, this means I need to unearth my quilting frame in the basement first, and that means I REALLY need to get the baby clothes taken care of! Good thing that's already on my Get It Done list for the month!

Happy Sewing!