2021 MidYear Quilty Ambitions Check In

Back in December 2020, Quilting Jet Girl hosted the 2021 Planning Party to give everyone a chance to think about goals for the new year.  Well, 2021 is more than half over and it's time to check in on the progress (or lack thereof) on My 2021 Quilty Ambitions as part of the 2021 MidYear Checkin. 

2021 Quilty Ambition #1: Finish 8 Quilts in 2021

I'm not doing so hot on this one.  As of July 1st there are only two finishes in 2021. 

My May and June were pretty crappy months at work, so I didn't get much done in the sewing room. That's disappointing.  But in 2020 there were only 2 quilts finished by 7/1/2020, but there were 7 finished by the end of the year. So there is still hope to meet this goal.  

The other part of this goal is to play along with Quilting Gail's PHD in 2021.  

The biggest achievement here is that there are no new projects started so far this year. That will change, but limiting the new starts will help me focus on finishing off the older projects.  

2021 Quilty Ambition #2: Stay Focused

To move quilts to finished, I have to stay focused on just a few projects.  What's worked for me on that front is to limit my weekly to do list to just 3 projects.  If I'm trying to finish up a quilt, I'll let the number of focus projects increase to 4. There are 3 focus projects at the moment.  

Beginning of the year to end of June progress on
Unity (Bonnie Hunter), Morewood Mystery (Meadow Mist Designs),
Cabins and Fans (self designed)

Unity, Morewood Mystery, and Cabin and Fans are the current focus projects.  Morewood Mystery should go out for quilting this month and I'm hoping to have Cabins and Fans ready to go out next month.  Unity has been my leaders and enders project. I'm hoping it's ready to be finished up in September. That will get me to five finishes for the year. 

2021 Quilty Ambition #3: Continue to Host the 15 Minutes to Stitch Linky Party 

As of week 27, there have been 26 weekly 15 Minute to Stitch linky parties. I only missed week 14 (due to work trauma, it's been a bad year on that front).  At the end of June, my success rate at finding 15 minutes to stitch was 85.64%.   My goal is to stitch 85% of the days this year, so I'm on track with this goal.  

Not a bad first half of the year, but I'm hoping for better the second half.  Linking up with Quilting Jet Girl's 2021 Midyear Checkin.

2021 Quilting Ambitions

As 2020 winds down it's normal to look ahead to what the plan is for 2021.  Yvonne of Quilting Jet Girl is again hosting her yearly planning linky party, so it's time to commit to a written plan for next year. 

2021 Quilty Ambition #1:  Finish 8 Quilts in 2021

I've been aiming to finish 12 quilts in one year pretty much since I've started writing up annual goals.  The most I've ever finished in a given year is 7. 

As long as I'm working full time, it's doubtful I'm going to manage 12, but I might be able to manage 8.  That's a lot more realistic than  setting the goal so high only to keep falling so short. 

To stay accountable and on track, I'll be following along with Quilting Gails 2021 PHD program.  

 

PHD is short for projects half done or projects that have to be done.  Since I'm not likely to finish the required 12 quilts, I'm going to work towards my MS (mostly sewn) for 2021.   

2021 Quilty Ambition #2: Stay focused

One thing I learned this year, is that to finish quilts, I have to focus on fewer projects.  Before 2020, my usual mode of operation was to work on 5 or 6 projects at at time.  

Working on that many projects at a time means you don't really make good progress on any of them.  This year I started selecting a priority project to finish.  That becomes my number one priority for the week/month when I write out my weekly To Do List.  Linking up with Roseanne and Sue (Home Sewn by Us) each week has helped keep me on track.  I strive to limit the weekly to do's to no more than 3 or  4. 

Another part of staying focused is to limit the number of new projects. I only started three new projects in 2020. Due to college graduation coming up in 2022, I need to get going on graduation quilts, so next year the plan is to only start 4 new projects.

2021 Quilty Ambition #3: Continue to host the 15 Minutes To Stitch Linky Party

It's sometimes hard to get into the sewing room, so challenging myself to work in 15 minutes of stitching time a day is still important.  I'm going to adopt my 2020 goal of stitching 85% of the days for 2021. I've successfully managed 90% a couple of years, but with work having ramped up the last year, I don't want to make myself miserable. The idea is to encourage myself to go sew, but not punish myself if life has other ideas. 

That's my three quilty ambitions for 2021.  There are no ambitions around stash management or blogging.  I've learned over the years that I ignore the stash management goals (I just like fabric too much) and blogging depends on how life is going at the moment. My focus  is to dramatically work down my UFO list. If I do that, fabric usage will take care of itself.  

Good luck with your quilting ambitions this year!