It’s done! Oh my gosh, I don’t know that I’ve ever finished this early! I absolutely love this smaller format. 🙂 I couldn’t resist adding a few half pages, but overall I kept it very simple this year and I’m thrilled with the results.
Pixelated Heart Quilt
You guys! I think I’m finally making friends with my sewing machine. At the very least we are no longer enemies. lol. I was playing around on instagram the day after Christmas and I came across some pixelated heart quilts. Oh my goodness, y’all! They were gorgeous in all their rainbow fabulousness. I figured, how hard could it be? lol. So I ignored my massive to do list and printed off some graph paper.
I’ve been wanting to play around with a low volume background and this seemed like the perfect project! I grided it into 4 patches just so I could stay organized and came up with a plan for ironing the seams.
Then I started making a bunch of low volume 4 patches! I made myself do all of the backgrounds before I started in on the 4 patches with the hearts. I had a bit of a hard time keeping the 4 patches that made up the heart organized, but in the end I labeled them all with a frixion pen and it worked.
The sewing machine tried to give me some flack when I had to refill the bobbin, but I persevered and came out on top.
My biggest stumbling block came when I laid them all out on the floor only to realize that there was no way I could leave them out like that. lol. I was definitely seeing the appeal of a design wall! My design floor works great when my twins are asleep, but I was feeling the pressure to get this together so I could clean it up before I went to bed.
I ended up getting most of it sewn together into 16 patches before I went to bed and was able to finish it up the next night- New Year’s Eve! Do I know how to party or what. lol.
In the end, I love it! I wish I had had more variety of low volume prints, but I’m quite pleased with the way it turned out. Now I just need to figure out how I want to quilt it!
Christmas Hexies
Remember my secret sewing back during NaNoCraftMo? I finished it!
Well, I mostly finished it. lol. I wanted to make it as a surprise for my grandmother and I nearly succeeded. I got all of the hexagons EPP’d and appliqued onto the background. I even managed to baste it and hand quilt it! But then I was stuck when it came to the binding. In my defense, I just haven’t learned how to do it properly! So I wrapped up the (nearly finished) quilt along with the fabric for the binding and gave it to my grandmother like that. You guys, she was so excited! I meant for us to bind it together, but she was so excited that the next time I saw her she’d already finished. lol. It finished at about 15 inches square and I’m really pleased at how it turned out. 🙂
January Goals
It seems silly to be setting more goals after just writing a short novel about my 2020 goals, but y’all know I love my monthly goals posts! So I’ll keep this short and sweet. First, looking back at December.
- December Daily. Well, I didn’t finish it, but I did get 13 days of it done so that’s something. I’m putting this one first on the list for January.
- Secret Sewing. Mostly done! I made a wall hanging for my grandmother and I got it all epp’d, appliqued, even hand quilted! But I just couldn’t figure out the binding. lol. So in the end, I wrapped it up with the fabric for the binding and we’re going to finish it together. 🙂 I’m planning to write a whole blog post about it once it’s finished.
- Bluebonnets. I wanted to finish appliquing all 6 of my bluebonnets, and I’m happy to report that I got 3 more done bringing my grand total to 5! I also made some progress on the bookshelf block. 🙂
- Advent Activities. I actually struggled with this and I don’t know why. But in the end, we had a great advent.
- Buy all the things. Check.
- Wrap all the things. Check.
- Decorate. Check. And for bonus points, we got it all packed away yesterday!
- 9 Patches. I actually got 18 9 patches done! I’m seriously happy with my progress.
- Montessori Trays. Ugh. I got nothing done.
- Windchime. Also got nothing done. lol. But I did piece a whole quilt top in less than a week! Maybe I’ll write a blog post about that too. lol.
Which brings us to January. Hmm….
- Write thank you notes. This needs to happen today or tomorrow.
- December Daily. I’d like to finish this this month so that I can really start on some of my scrapbooking catch up goals.
- Project Life. I’d like to do June 2019.
- 4 new Montessori trays. Should I revisit the snow theme from last January, or pull out our Valentine’s Day stuff early… decisions decisions.
- Girl Scouts. I need to map out our spring semester, and I need to plan our meetings for January. I also need to deal with cookies.
- Blog! I’d love to write, hmmm… 6 blog posts?
- Butterfly/ Caterpillars. I need to make some serious progress on the applique, and I need to finalize the design for the embroidery so I can get started on that.
- 5 bags of trash gone. January always makes me want to get rid of all of the things!
- Plan with Kate. Kate wanted to get a planner! Naturally I was all over this. We sat down on Monday and set them up together and it was so fun! I’m hoping this is a good tool for Kate and I’d love it to be a habit for her before she starts middle school next year. So my plan is for us to sit down every Sunday and set up the next week.
- 10k steps a day. I know better than to set a goal for working out 3 times a week, but I’m hoping I can ease myself into better habits by starting with walking every day. Fingers crossed!
And goodness, that’s 2 posts in a row that are just a wall of text with no pics! I’ll try to make the next post a little bit more interesting! lol.
20×20 in 2020
Y’all! New Year’s is always my favorite. I’m so motivated to clean up, get organized, and tackle a million projects! This generally lasts for about 2 weeks, lol. But I’m not about to let my abysmal track record stop me from setting some truly ambitious goals for the year! Since it’s 2020, I couldn’t resist being a little extra and setting 20 goals for the year. And each goal has 20 parts! Let me preface this by stating that I know there there isn’t a chance in hell that I get all of this done, but even a fraction of this would be awesome, so without further ado here are my 20x20in2020!
- 20 months of project life. I am so far behind on this project which makes me sad because it’s one of favorites to look back on. Also, I get a beautiful kit every month! I am currently working on June of 2019, so even if I get all the way to December 2020 that’s still only 19 months. My work around is that I’m going to count the ending page of 2019 and the opening page of 2020 as a month. I think that to make this goal happen I’m going to have to just sit down and do a huge batch of photo editing which is not my fav… but needs must.
- 20 months of scrapbooking. I have fallen so far behind on the kids’ scrapbooks… I’m currently on August of 2018. ::cringe:: 2019 was the year that I really fell deep into the quilty rabbit hole and the majority of my free time went to that hobby. I don’t regret that decision at all, but I think I want to do a combo of things to make sure that I am still scrapping the most important memories that I don’t want to forget. 1. I think I am going to dedicate one of my 2 preschool days a week to scrapping/ project life. I think I am also going to cut down on the number of stories I am trying to tell a month. I mean, do I really need 15 pages from August 2018?
- 20 nights of hexies. Ah, my poor neglected hexies. I enjoy doing handwork in the evenings, but lately I’ve been reaching for my applique. I would like to devote 20 nights to my hexies over the course of the year. If I do that, I feel confident that I can finish up my last super hexie block and then hopefully I will be motivated to finish!
- 20 new adventures with my kids. This breaks down to roughly 2 a month which seems super doable. These could be as elaborate as my scheme to convince RaptorDad to come with us to the Grand Canyon over spring break (jury is still out on that one) or as simple as a picnic dinner at the park.
- 20 new Montessori trays. This is roughly 4 news trays for 5 new themes. And recycling materials is fair game!
- 20 activities with my Girl Scouts. This seems like a lot, but I’m anticipating starting a troop for Mia this fall when she starts kindergarten. (Please excuse me while I go have a panic attack at the thought of the babies starting kindergarten!)
- 20 blocks for my Texas Forever quilt. I currently have 21/63 done so getting 20 more done seems doable.
- 20 blog posts. That’s roughly 2 a month. Surely I can manage that! lol.
- 20 new recipes. In my mind these are all healthy recipes. Who wants to bet that next December they were all desserts. lol.
- 20 liturgical living activities. The kids and I really enjoy these when I manage to pull them together. I like to build on what we started last year and add a few more.
- 20 organization/ home projects. If I’m honest, these are probably going to take place in the fall once all of the kids are in school full time. I really want to install a backsplash in our kitchen. I’d also like to repaint our kitchen and guest bathroom. Also, want to do another big purge reorg of our kid art supplies/ games closet. And I would love to get rid of 85% of the crap in our master bedroom and make it a soothing retreat. Also, big kid room for the twins.
- 20 butterflies/ caterpillars/ fruit. Yikes. I really want this done for the twin’s birthday in April, but I’m just not sure it’s possible without paying to have them quilted. The first hurdle is to finish the tops though!
- 20 nine patches for caterpillars. I got a bunch of these done in December, so I’m not even sure that I need 20 anymore. Still, the plan is to have a row of pinwheels at the top and bottom so maybe I’ll say 20 nine patches/ pinwheels.
- 20 date nights. Maybe my favorite on the list! These are for at home date nights. I want to come up with some creative date nights for us. New board games? Cooking class? Wood working? Book club? Only time will tell.
- 20 plants from seed. This spring I want to plant a garden with the kids from seeds so that they can watch them germinate. I’m hoping for some tomatoes!
- 20 hours of staff development. Boring. So boring. But I need to keep chipping away at this.
- 20 new books. I’m actually thinking I might find some list of books and try to read them?
- 20 bags of trash gone. Self explanatory.
- 20 boxes to the Caring Place. (It’s like goodwill, but local.)
- 20 pounds gone. Alright, I’m cheating a little on these last 3 because since Christmas we’ve already gotten rid of a bag of trash, a box for the caring place, and I’ve got a nasty post Christmas cold that has helped me drop 4 pounds. I’m not letting that go to waste!
I’m going to track these on the sidebar for my blog, and I’ll also post some progress pics on instagram with the hashtag #20x20in2020 .
December Daily Day 7
You guys! December Daily is one of my favorite projects, but historically I struggle to keep up with it during December and end up finishing it sometime over the summer. And in 2017 I didn’t finish it at all. ::womp womp:: So last year I switched to a smaller 4×4 format and I freaking love it! Today is December 7th, and I sat down this morning and knocked out days 3-7 while my kiddos watched a little video on St Nicholas. 🙂
I was having so much fun that I dug out my 2017 album with the intention of knocking it out too, but the larger 6×8 size was so intimidating! Not to mention that many days had extra page protectors inserted to accommodate more photos and cards. I love the style, but it’s just not right for this crazy time in our lives! I’m stuck on December 16th which is when we had our big extended family Christmas and I am dreading sorting though and printing all of the photos.
But you know what? It’s been 2 years already… it can wait a bit longer. lol. I think I’m going to pack up the December Daily stuff until next weekend and work on prepping more windchime blocks. 🙂
December Goals!
We made it through November! And even though I missed posting a few days on Instagram, I actually crafted every single day so I’m counting #NaNoCraftMo2019 as a success. 🙂 Let’s look at how I did in November.
1.Christmas Half Square Triangles. Done! I toyed with the idea of getting this quilted and bound before the end of the month, but I quickly realized that was an insane idea. But I did get the entire top finished, and I’ve got the fabric for the backing, so once the holiday craziness calms down I’ll get back to it. I probably spent as much time with the seam ripper as I did the sewing machine, but I’m super happy with the end result. I just love love love this Bonnie and Camille Christmas fabric!
2. Kaffe Quilt. I finished my blocks! My grandmother is still working on her blocks, but she had way more to do than me. lol. Once we get it done, I’ll try to take some pics for the blog. 🙂
3. Zipper Pouch. Well, I forgot to add the handle, but I’m pretty pleased nonetheless. Our exchange is on Tuesday and I’m anxious to see how it’s received!
4. Advent Calendar. You guys. I have come to the realization that there is no way I am going to finish this in time for Christmas. Now sure, I could stitch my fingers to the bone trying, but I wouldn’t really enjoy it, and you know what? This is a hobby! So I am quite pleased with the significant progress that I did make, and I’m going to pack it away for a while.
5. Project Life. Well, I got 1 layout done. :/
6. Scrapping. Not much better, but I did get 6 pages done. I’m really hoping that December Daily reignites my scrappy mojo!
7. Gratitude Tree. This was a great idea, but it didn’t work out as I envisioned it this year. But, we got through about 7 days and it was a great proof of concept! And you know what? Next year when the babies are a year older, I bet this is awesome!
8. Thanksgiving Baking. Huge success! We made 2 day Chocolate Chip Cookies and white chocolate covered popcorn for Thanksgiving Eve. Then between 2 dinners for actual Thanksgiving, we made: a double batch of oreo truffles, 2 pumpkin pies, 2 lemon merengue pies, 1 cherry pie (I make all of my own pie crust), a gluten free cheesecake, a double batch of mac n cheese, and broccoli cheese rice casserole. Man, I’m tired just typing that! But I seriously love baking and seeing other people enjoy things that I make so I tend to go a but overboard. lol.
9. December Daily Prep. I actually didn’t do any prep aside from ordering some more photo paper, but you know what? Still a win! And I’ve already done the spread for Day 1! On day 1!
10. Secret Sewing. I’m making excellent progress! 2 of the 3 projects are completed, and I’m very close to completing the 3rd. 🙂
Time for December Goals!
- December Daily. I don’t know that it is actually possible, but I would love to finish this in December. I’m keeping it really small, 4×4, so I think it’s theoretically possible? We’ll see. lol.
- Secret Sewing. One final project to go!
- Texas Forever Quilt. I want to finish appliqueing (why does that look like it is spelled so wrong?) all of the bluebonnets. I have everything prepped and I have 2 1/2 of the 6 done.
- Advent Activities. I have the month all mapped out, I just need to execute it. lol.
- Buy all the things. Oh my gosh, we haven’t even started shopping.
- Wrap all the things. I need to find this year’s wrapping paper!
- Decorate. I was going to do this today, but I just didn’t happen. I did dig out a purple candle though, so at least we had part of an advent wreath for dinner.
- It wasn’t on my list last month, but I actually made a ton of progress on the butterfly and caterpillar quilts! This month, I’d like to keep making progress on the applique and also knock out some more 9 patches.
- Montessori Trays. Since the kids will be off of school for a few weeks, I really want to have some new trays in place! I’m thinking Christmas themed. And I need to do them sooner rather than later. lol.
- Windchime Quilt. I’d love to prep the next block! I’ve now got 3 done and they make me so happy to look at on my wall. 🙂
Windchime Quilt Progress
Considering how far behind I am on my Christmas to do list, I probably shouldn’t admit that I spent last week working on my third windchime block instead, but you know what?!? I regret nothing!
I am having so much fun with this Sue Daley pattern! It is perfect for showcasing all the little little fussy cuts that I’ve collected. Have I mentioned that I’m obsessed with fussy cutting? lol.
As much as I want to rush on and start on the next block right now, I’m going to try to hold off for a bit while I collect some more fabric. I’m not sure if I will end up succeeding, but for now I have zero repeats.
Who am I kidding… I will probably start cutting out more fabric tonight! lol.
Christmas Half Square Triangle Quilt
I finally finished my Christmas Half Square Triangle quilt top! This one has been in the works for about a year, but I put it aside because it was all pieced- no handwork- and I’m much better at hand work than piecing. lol. Still, I learned tons! (Who knew you had to square up 1/2 square triangles?!? Apparently everyone in the world except me. lol.) And I love love love the fabric so it makes me happy to look at.
Originally I was hoping to have this quilted and bound by the end of the month, but seeing as how it’s a quilt for me and I have approximately 4 thousand other projects for other people that need to be finished by Christmas, I’m going to set it aside for a while and focus on my other projects. Plus, that gives me time to ponder how I want to quilt it. 🙂 Any suggestions?
November!
Y’all. It’s November! And I had the opposite of a productive October so it’s time to kick it into high gear! First let’s look at how I did for October.
1.Super Hexie Block. I actually got this one done! So now I literally only need to do 1 more block and then all of the hexies will be basted. The end is near!
2. Windchime Quilt. Well, I didn’t get it appliqued, but I did get it all sewn together and ready to go so that’s something. lol.
3. Butterfly Quilt. Does buying more fabric count as progress? lol.
4. Caterpillar Quilt. Same.
5. Project Life. Oh my gosh, y’all, I didn’t do anything with Project Life this month! I’m afraid that my scrappy mojo has left the building.
6. Scrapping. Ditto. I literally only made 2 pages this month. ::shame::
7. Advent Calendar. Um… Are y’all sensing a pattern? That pattern is that nothing much of anything got done.
8. Halloween. Finally a win! Costumes were made, pictures were taken, and too much candy was eaten. Poor Mia was sick the night before so she missed her Halloween party at school, but she rallied for Trick or Treating so we took her to a few houses. Also, Kate made her own costume this year! I’m so proud of her. 🙂
9. Camping Trip. Well, we got all of the prep work done and then some. Sadly, Kate and I had to leave unexpectedly on Friday night, but my co-leaders are amazeballs and they took over seamlessly and handled everything.
10. Pumpkin Patch Pictures. ::sigh:: I took them. I even took my real camera. But the babies were sooooooo not having it. Le sigh. Also, they were almost sold out of pumpkins. Oh well. Next year, I’m going to try to finish costumes much earlier so we can do the pumpkin patch while there are still pumpkins!
And now onto November!
1.Christmas Quilt. The UFO for this month is my Christmas 1/2 square triangle quilt. I have the center finished, but I still need to cut and add the borders. I was toying with the idea of trying to have it fully quilted and bound by the meeting, but I’m pretty sure that’s never going to happen. lol. So let’s say that I would like to have the top done.
2. Kaffe Quilt. My grandmother and I are making a joint quilt! No pressure. lol. This one has a bit of back story that should really be it’s own post. Stay tuned! The short version is that I need to make 66 blocks this month.
3. Zipper Pouch. For our Guild Christmas party, we are exchanging zipper pouches. I was super intimidated, but I made a practice one and I’m actually pretty happy with it. Now I just need to make the one for the actual exchange!
4. Advent Calendar. It’s crunch time. I have to have the background done this month. Then maybe I can try for one thing each day in December? Yikes!
5. Project Life. No excuses y’all. I have to get at least June done.
6. Scrapping. Um… I don’t even know, y’all. Maybe 10 pages?
7. Gratitude Tree. This is a crazy idea that I had yesterday. Basically, I want to have a big tree on the wall in our living room (made out of paper) and then we will each add a leaf every day where we write down 1 thing that we are grateful for. In my mind, we each get a different color and then we have a beautiful rainbow tree at the end of the month. The reality is that I still don’t have any paper for this, let alone paper that is cut into the shapes of leaves! lol. But fingers crossed I can make this happen today!
8. Thanksgiving Baking. I need to sit down and work on my baking menu and schedule to make sure that everything gets done.
9. December Daily Prep. Yay! I love December Daily. I’m sticking with a 4×4 format this year. I ::gasp:: didn’t even buy a kit because nothing was striking my fancy this year. That and I have enough Christmas product to open a December Daily store. lol.
10. I have a little bit of secret sewing that I need to finish this month. Fingers crossed!
After a so so October, you might be wondering how on earth I’m planning to get so much done in November, but RaptorDad does NaNoWriMo every November where he writes a whole 50k word novel. Every eyar I try to make NaNoCraftMo a thing, but I lose steam and end up binge watching Netflix. This year will (hopefully) be different!