Back in January, I drafted a strategic plan (?) for 2026. Strategic Plan is probably a gross overstatement of what I actually put together, but it was at least a potential road map for my quilting decisions. Now that we are in 3rd quarter, I should probably take a look at where I'm at and decide on any adjustments.
2nd Quarter Strategy
1. Guild BOM: Finish May through October blocks. Finish Flying geese.
The May, June and July blocks are all finished. The flying geese for the alternate border are also all finished. The instructions are written for the August and September blocks. I needed to verify the cutting dimensions for some of the pieces for the October block and that got done last week. So I didn't get everything done, but I'm also not too far off track. If I put focus on this project in July, I should be back on track before we got too far into third quarter.
2. Wild and Goosey: Continue as leaders and enders project
All the blue 3.5" blocks were finished last quarter and most of the blocks were sashed. The hope is this project will be ready for assembly before the end of the year.
3. Move UFOs to finished quilt tops.
Three of the 5 UFOs became finished quilt tops: 2026 SAHRR, Magnificent Mystery and Old Town. Lupine and Laughter only needs two more borders added to be a completed quilt top. The remaining pieces needed to assemble the blocks for Good Fortune have been cut. The chain blocks are all finished, but still working on the star blocks. I didn't get it all done, but at least every project on the plan is farther along.
4. Walking foot quilting
The plan was to finish off two quilts, but only Chilhowie was finished up. Glowing Hearts has been pulled out of the closet, the batting laid out to relax and I've been contemplating quilting motifs. So even though it didn't get done, at least there was a bit of progress on it. Based on how the walking foot quilting has been going, one quilt a quarter seems to be my speed, at least for now.
5. External quilting
A backing was pieced for the 2025 Inverted Star BOM. Both the backing and the quilt top were prepped for quilting. I delivered the project to the long armer the first week in July. So at least that one will be a finished quilt in third quarter. I didn't even touch Chocolate Marshmallow. It's probably going to go to the bottom of the list as My Girl has picked a few quilts that will be going to college and graduate school friends. So those will higher priority the last half of the year.
Second quarter wasn't a total success, but I have learned a lot. I'm doing well at moving projects to finished quilt tops. That will help a lot in clearing out my UFO list. But I'm not doing so hot on either the walking foot quilting or getting quilts ready for external quilting. It seems one quilt top for each a quarter is about my speed on that part of the UFO process. I'll have to consider if that modifies my strategy for third quarter or not. At any rate, there's been reasonable progress on all of my "strategies". Not a bad first half of the year.
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