Year's Wrap-Up

Tying up loose ends. That is what I will cover in this post. Taking stock of what I've accomplished this calendar year, the things I finished as well as the things I left unfinished gives the end of the year closure - tidied up and put neatly away.

Cheryl at Meadow Mist Designs is hosting a link-up for bloggers to post their year-end roundup. I will spend some time Sunday perusing what other quilters have accomplished through this year.

My Top Five Quilting Accomplishments for 2016

1. Hand-Quilting Two Quilts
     Yes, it seems impossible to me that I did it, but I hand quilted most of the Scrappy 6-Pointed Star (some of it was started last year) and all of Erin's Diamonds. I just finished it today and I will devote tomorrow's blog post to that quilt. Hand quilting is not something to enter into lightly. The time required to finish a full-size quilt is enormous. When the job is complete, I find myself a bit lost, wondering what on earth I will do now to fill my time. It's quite a strange feeling.

 2. Making Elisa's Quilt
      I had 4 commissions total this year, and I am pleased with how all turned out. Elisa's, though, was quite the undertaking. I agreed in March to make a king-size quilt, without a pattern, based on a picture found on Pinterest, using a sheet as the backing and machine quilt it myself. All in about 6 months. In hindsight, I wonder what on earth I was thinking. But you know, probably 4 of those 6 months, I spent on work being done in my head! I had so much to figure out. Knowing that Elisa loves it makes it all worth it; I am pretty proud that I did it.

3. Having More Blog Posts This Year
     I don't know if anyone besides me pays attention to this sort of thing, but I had my personal best in the number of posts I wrote this year. The previous record was 2012's total of 246. This year I will have 250. (The next one is written and scheduled for tomorrow, the last day of 2016.) I feel like I am getting better at writing. I agonize over some posts while others are effortless. I do like to be reliable with no more than a couple of days between posts. In a perfect scenario, I'd do one every day, but I feel like I busted my buns to get 250 done. That might be a good max for me to shoot for next year.

4. Getting Quilts Quilted; Out of the Closet
      My goal for the year was to send 12 quilts out for long-arm quilting - one per month. Well, I fell short of that goal, but I did send out 3, in addition to 3 commissions and a wedding quilt. (A second wedding quilt will be coming back in January.) Then add in the ones I quilted myself, both on the machine and by hand; all in all, I feel pretty good about this accomplishment. Each finish is pictured in the "2016 Quilts" tab at the top of this blog. Getting a quilt quilted is not a cheap proposition, even when your quilter is as reasonably priced at mine is. (Thank you, Terry!) One per month was always a target to aim for, but every quilter knows that new things come along moving something down on the list of priorities.  As it turns out, I probably got done all that I could given that Terry had terrible troubles with her quilting machine for most of the summer. Even though I fell way short of the one per month goal, I am more than satisfied with my results.

5. Improving the Organization of My Sewing Room
     One thing leads to another, don't you know, and when we decided that we'd paint the downstairs and turn the computer room (which had become a messy catch-all) into a formal dining room, we had a very large Ikea table to move out. It has become my cutting table, but the reorganization required in order to get it in here was massive. Now that it's done, I find that I am making an effort to keep things where they belong and not let the mess get out of hand like it was before. This is a really fun room to work in now, and I want it to stay that way.

There you have it - my top 5 accomplishments for this year. Click on over to Meadow Mist and the link-up. I bet we'll all find inspiration there!

Happy Quilting, Friends!