Working on UFO's

Since the first of the year, I have thought about all of my UFO's. I have alot of flimsies and I plan on quilting those or having them quilted this year...Those are not the UFO's I'm talking about. I'm talking about quilts that have been started where the blocks are half done, or all the blocks are done and just sitting and waiting to be put together. I have more than a few of these. I joined the UFO challenge to get at least 10 of these completely finished this year; I do plan to finish all of my UFO's this year. I want all of my UFO's at least to the flimsy stage by June 1. From that point, I will work on either quilting them myself or having them quilted. I find that I get more done if I set goals and this is my goal for this year. So far, I am doing pretty well with it and am really enjoying working on some of my old projects. There for a while I was really burnt out with my sewing. You see, I worked in a quilt shop for 10 years and I have done alot of samples over the years. I have done alot of stuff that I didn't enjoy too. The colors weren't mine, the pattern wasn't one that I would have picked, etc. and when you turn your hobby into a job, it tends to take the joy or fun out of it. I quit working at the quilt shop and quit sewing as much for awhile. I turned to tatting and really enjoyed doing that. I am now refreshed and have started enjoying my sewing again.

Last night, I made a block for my Pansy Park quilt. This is block 5 and I have 7 blocks to go. This is a Thimbleberries kit I bought about 5 years ago. I still like this quilt alot and am determined to get this done. Here's block 5:




I then sewed 12 of my Pineapple blocks together in pairs. I was going to do this as leaders and enders but the blocks are way too big for that... I'm going to sew these in pairs first. My quilt is 7 blocks X 8 blocks long. So, the pairs will be fine....I'll do more as the week goes by. I stopped sewing on these and picked up block 11 and continued embroidering. I feel like I'm really accomplishing something now and it's a good feeling.