To-Do Tuesday: Let's Try Setting Itty-Bitty Goals This Time!

Okay, people.  You have seen me setting montrously lofty goals, and you have snickered or soothed me when I failed to reach them (depending upon whether you're the snickering sort of the soothing sort, naturally).  Well, if at first we don't succeed, we try, try again!

I'm scaling it back, though.  Forget about finishing Tabby Mountain -- I'm exploring my options for transferring a fancy feather design onto that partially quilted project without taking it off the quilting frame, and I'm waiting on some products to show up in my mailbox before I can resume those experiments.  So for this week, here are my goals:

1. Paper piece ONE more pineapple block for my California King Pineapple Log Cabin project:

My Pineapple Log Cabin Quilt, In Progress Since 2014

2. Resolve my bloody red dye problem with for this long-abandoned Jingle BOM blocks and get them up on my design wall:

Center Medallion for My Jingle BOM Quilt, In Progress Since 2013

Some of My Smaller Pieced and Appliqued Blocks For This Quilt

3. Make a start on my Queen Esther's Garden applique BOM.  Like, even the SMALLEST beginning step starts.  So far all I've done is prewashed my fabric, so even if I just prepare the background blocks this week, that counts!

My Queen's Garden Fabrics, Prewashed and Ready to Go

Esther Aliu's Beautiful Free BOM pattern

And, you know what?  That's plenty of goals for me this week.  I'm linking up with To-Do On Tuesday, and then I'm headed straight up to my studio to start a pineapple block!  I'm also linking up with:

• ·       Let’s Bee Social at www.sewfreshquilts.blogspot.ca/
• ·       Midweek Makers at www.quiltfabrication.com/
• ·       WOW WIP on Wednesday at www.estheraliu.blogspot.com
• ·       WIPs With Friends at www.mamaspark.blogspot.com

OMG, It's Groundhog Day (Again)! This Beast Is Pieced, But She Ain't Been Quilted

Finishing Tabby Mountain is My OMG -- Again!

So, remember that 1993 Bill Murray movie where his character is stuck in a time warp and is forced to relive the same day over and over again until he finally gets it right?  

Well, it's Groundhog Day again for me, because my March OMG (One Monthly Goal) is to relive my February OMG since I didn't get it finished.  My goal was to finish piecing AND quilting my Tabby Mountain quilt, and I didn't even finish assembling the quilt top by February 28th.  

Marking and Pinning These 30 Degree Triangles Slowed Down the Piecing Big Time

I came close -- I had all of the rows of triangles pieced by the evening of the 27th and I COULD have worked on joining all the rows into a completed quilt top on the 28th to at least get the quilt top finished by the end of the month.  But something inside of me rebelled.  There had been too much sewing for me on the 27th, too much pressure to have something to show for myself at the end of month linky party, and it was stressing me out.  So I opted to do no sewing at all on the last day of the month, and instead I finished assembling my quilt top on March 3rd.  

Joining Rows Together

If February had 31 days instead of 28, I would have finished the quilt top by the end of the month even with my day off!

Otto a.k.a. Mister Baby a.k.a. My Sweet Baboo, Supervising Quilt Construction

So anyway, looking forward to March: Apparently I erred on the side of overambition with my February OMG, so for March my OMG is just going to be QUILTING & BINDING TABBY MOUNTAIN.  That will involve:

1. Removing stray threads and pet fur from the quilt top with a tape roller and giving it a final pressing
2. Finding or purchasing batting
3. Pressing my backing fabric and cutting it to size

   

   Tabby Mountain backing: Free Fall in Orchid by Tula Pink

4. Loading the quilt on my longarm frame, most likely doing a full float
5. Selecting thread colors
6. Basting the horizontal seamlines and quilt edges to ensure they remain nice and straight
7. SID (Stitch In the Ditch) along all of those diagonal seam lines
8. Ruler work in the solid fabric patches

   

   My Quilting Plan for Tabby Mountain

9. Free motion quilting in the print fabric patches
10. Trimming the finished quilt
11. Making and attaching binding (and I haven't selected the binding fabric yet, either)

Of course, I'm really hoping to get a few other things accomplished in the sewing room this month as well.  Is it against the rules of this challenge to set Gold Star Bonus Goals in addition to the OMG?  Because I'd like to finish my Tabby Mountain quilt well before the end of March, and then I also hope to:

1. Finish the partially-completed pineapple log cabin block that I started last month.  17 strips have been sewn to the foundation paper, and 80 more strips need to be added to finish the block.
   
2. Get started and caught up with the new applique BOM project designed by Esther Aliu, Queen's Garden.  Although I've selected and prewashed my fabrics for this project, I have yet to begin Blocks 1 and 2, which were released in January and February, and Block 3 will be released in about a week.  

   

   My Fabrics for Queen's Garden

There, now -- that should be MORE than enough to keep me busy this month, don't you think?  

And so, despite being unsuccessful the first time I tried this One Monthly Goal thing, I'm linking up again for March.  Wish me luck!

I'm also linking up with:

• ·       Design Wall Monday at Small Quilts and Doll Quilts http://smallquiltsanddollquilts.blogspot.com  
• ·       Main Crush Monday at Cooking Up Quilts http://www.cookingupquilts.com/
• ·       Monday Making at Love Laugh Quilt http://lovelaughquilt.blogspot.com/
• ·       Moving it Forward at Em’s Scrap Bag: http://emsscrapbag.blogspot.com.au/
• ·       BOMs Away at Katie Mae Quilts: www.katiemaequilts.com

In Which I Shamelessly Flaunt My CCD: Compulsive Creative Disorder

My Math quilt remains untouched on my longarm frame (perhaps today or tomorrow?).  My Tabby Mountain quilt remains on my design wall, since I had to order a couple Kaffe Fassett prints to replace the creepy Cat Eyes fabric (maybe by end of this week, or early next week the fabric will get here?).  I don't feel like making a pineapple block right now, I'm bored with my eight identical in-progress Frankenwhiggish Rose applique blocks, and I'm not in the right mood to finish the Jingle BOM applique top or to make more Farmer's Wife blocks or clam shells or to start any of my one patch project ideas.  But I was just over on Esther Aliu's blog and saw her free BOM applique project for 2018, Queen's Garden.  I am in love.  Not too easy, not too difficult, not too repetitive, and perfect for all my bright, splashy scraps of fabric.  I HAVE TO MAKE THIS QUILT!

Queen's Garden, 70 x 70 Free BOM by Esther Aliu

I have been reading on the Internet, folks, and it has come to my attention that an awful lot of quilters out there have an awful lot more projects-in-progress than I do.  You can call them WIPs (Works In Progress), UFOs (UnFinished Objects), or Proof of Mom's Poor Work Ethic (what my son Anders calls MY projects-in-progress), but I'm pretty sure that it's not an actual SIN to start a new project before finishing an old one.  And if it IS a sin, well, at least it's not a MORTAL sin.  Certainly nothing I need to confess in church and pray for forgiveness, right?  

You know, as I'm thinking about it, God Himself, the Creator of the Universe, has more WIPs than anyone.  Every human being on this planet is a WIP and UNICEF estimates that over 350,000 new babies (God's new projects) are being born every day.  

Infrared Portrait of God's WIPs and NewFOs in the Small Magellanic Cloud, Credit: ESO/ESA/JPL-Caltech/NASA/D. Gouliermis (MPIA) et al.

The Earth itself is a WIP, and the Universe is a WIP with new stars being born before all the old stars have burned out...  The picture above from Science Daily is of a dwarf galaxy near the Milky Way.  The blue areas show God's WIPs (stars that have been around awhile, but haven't yet burned out) and the red dots are all brand new stars being born, like so many new projects going on simultaneously in the heavens.  When I read in the Bible that we were created in God's image, to me that means God created us to BE creators.  

And so, based on this new Quilter's Theology that I have just invented (you're welcome), there is no such thing as Quilt Guilt because we were MADE to work on lots of different projects at once and to be CONSTANTLY STARTING NEW PROJECTS even though our other projects aren't finished yet, just like all those new babies being born and all those red dots in the Small Magellan Cloud dwarf galaxy.

Which just shows you the lengths that I am willing to go in order to justify my reckless decision to add YET ANOTHER new project, when all the other quilters on the Internet are making resolutions to finish what they've already started!  Hah!  But seriously -- this is my HOBBY.  It's supposed to be fun and it's supposed to be relaxing.  If I'm having fun and I'm relaxing, it doesn't matter if I EVER finish a quilt.  Finished quilts are happy accidents that occasionally happen in my studio, not regular occurrences or obligations.

Join me on the Dark Side, Ladies and Gentlemen -- and start a NEW project today!  Might I suggest Esther's new applique BOM?

Today I'm linking up with:

• ·       Design Wall Monday at Small Quilts and Doll Quilts http://smallquiltsanddollquilts.blogspot.com  
• ·       Main Crush Monday at Cooking Up Quilts http://www.cookingupquilts.com/
• ·       Monday Making at Love Laugh Quilt http://lovelaughquilt.blogspot.com/
• ·    Oh Scrap! at Quilting Is More Fun Than Housework: https://quiltingismorefunthanhousework.blogspot.com
• BOMs Away at Katie Mae Quilts: https://www.katiemaequilts.com
• Moving it Forward at Em’s Scrap Bag: http://emsscrapbag.blogspot.com.au/