Merry Christmas!

 

To Do List for the Week of 12/23/2025

I'm in the coasting portion of the Christmas holiday. The shopping is done, the presents wrapped, groceries bought (mostly). Now I can hang out with family and just chill out. There won't be any sewing room time between now and Christmas, but I'll have lots of time next weekend to decompress from the holiday with my machine.  Before getting to my probably bigger than realistic plans for next week, here is how this week went. 

To Do List for 12/16/2025

1.  My Girl Trivets: Quilt the kitty trivets ✔

2.  2026 Guild BOM: Start February block - no progress

3.  Magnificent Mystery: Work on Oct/Nov/Dec clues ✔

4.  Wild and Goosey: Continue making green blocks ✔

Not a bad week, three out of four items with check marks by them. With all the holiday prep in the works, the shorter list was definitely the way to go.  Since I'm hoping for some "nothing but sewing days" after the holiday, I'm going to go for a much longer to do list.

To Do List for 12/23/2025

1.  2026 Guild BOM: Start February block

The instructions are written, I just to make the block to ensure that they are correct. I have till the third week in January to get this done, but starting early is wise.  Plus, I'd really, really like to work ahead a bit so that I'm not in a bind if something happens and I can't get to my sewing room for a couple of weeks.  

2. Butterfly embroidery: Take a few stitches in the current butterfly

Not sure how much I'll get done on this, but any progress would be good.  

3. 2026 SAHRR (Quilting Gail): Decide on/start center block

I've played along with Stay at Home Round Robin the last 3 years. The resulting quilts are some of my family's favorites.  I wasn't going to play along this year.  I enjoy the challenge of designing a round that adds to the quilt, but it's a lot of sewing room time. After looking back at what other's did last year, I opened up Electric Quilt and played around a bit.  Out of that came a quilt that won't take endless sewing of small pieces to meet each round.  Now to figure out the fabrics and decide on the center block. 

4. Magnificent Mystery (Meadow Mist Designs): Work on Oct/Nov/Dec clues

Progress has been steady on all the clues for the last 3 months, but still aways to go to finish up these three.  At least all the component parts are made for the October clue, I just have to but them together.  

5. Lupine and Laughter (Bonnie Hunter): Press fabrics and start clues

I'm pretty far behind on this mystery, but there is a plan.  Last Friday's clue was a block. I'm going to start with the clue for the hour glass blocks used in the block and go from there.  I very often bail on some of Bonnie's sashing and borders. So I'll start with that block and go from there on what else I decide to make for my version.  That's usually what happens in the end anyway, so I may as well start off that way.  

6. Wild and Goosey (Bonnie Hunter): Continue making green blocks

Just need 2 more sets of 4 like this and the green blocks will be done.  Can I finish those before the end of the year?  It will be close, so maybe, maybe not.  

That's my list for this week. It's ambitious, but it's the end of the year, so I'd like to see what else I can make progress on before starting on next year's goals.  Linking up with the Quilt Schmilt for To Do Tuesday. 

Wishing everyone a very happy holiday season. Hope you are able to spend it with those you love.  

Deadline Sewing Done for December

The week before Christmas always seems to pass in a rush. I felt off for a couple of days early last week.  Thankfully it appears to be just my sinuses reacting to all the crap the strong winds blew in.  That slowed me down a bit on the stuff that had to get done, but didn't stop progress completely. All the gifts were wrapped yesterday. Even My Guy has all his wrapping done. There were two sewing projects that had deadlines this month.  The first was the guild BOM. 

This year's BOM includes a large Carpenter Star block as the focus point of the quilt. It's 32" x 32" finished. This is the January block for the guild.  This sampler quilt includes 9 8" finished blocks and two border blocks for a total of 12 blocks for this year's BOM. I have the instructions written for the next 3 blocks, now I just have to make them. But that's a task for after the holiday.  

The other deadline was to quilt and bind the kitty trivets that My Girl made for her cousin.  

The quilting definitely isn't perfect, but I think they still came out pretty cute.  This is the third set of placements I've quilted this year.  It's been an easy way to practice using the walking foot. I've definitely improved since the first set.  The plan is to apply those skills to finish off a few quilts next year.  

Now that the deadline stuff is all done, I can enjoy the holiday with nothing imminent hanging over my head.  Linking up with Patchwork & Quilts, Sew and Tell Monday, and Free Motion Mavericks.  Hope your holiday prep is winding down and you can enjoy the rest of the holiday.  

Stitching Stuff: Week 51 of 2025

 

It's the Sunday before Christmas. Just one more full week left in 2025. That's really hard to believe.  This week wasn't so busy as last week, but for some reason I was really tired early in the week. Maybe fighting something off as it's that time of year all kinds of yucky sicknesses are floating around.  At any rate, that's what ate into my sewing time this week, There was one day where I just felt yucky and ended up going to bed really early.

• 15 minute days/week = 6/7 days
• 15 minute days/Dec = 19/20 days
• 15 minute days/2025 = 309/354 days
• Success rate = 87.29%

Most of my stitching time this week has been focused on finishing off a Christmas gift.  Are you done with your holiday sewing or has it taken over your life?  

  

1. maggie f 2. Gretchen 3. Frédérique

4. Karen 5. DonnaleeQ 6. Melissa G

7. Bonnie Stapleton 8. Andrée at Quilting & Learning 9. Quilting Gail

Powered by... Mister Linky's Magical Widgets.

To Do List for the Week of 12/16/2025

With the holiday just around the corner, it's not been as easy to find time to stitch. Then to top it off, my foot pedal for my machine is acting up. It mostly works, then suddenly it will stop. I fiddle with it and it starts back up.  I have found a replacement, but as we have Christmas plans, I didn't want to order it right now.  Hopefully I can limp along till January.  

My sewing time this week was cut a bit short by holiday prep and a trip to see my mother.  Consequently, my to do list might as well be my didn't do list.  

To Do List for 12/9/2025

1. My Girl Trivets: Quilt the kitty trivets - no progress

2. 2026 Guild BOM: Finish January block ✔

3. Magnificent Mystery: Keep working on Oct/Nov/Dec clues ✔

4. Lupine and Laughter: Start on all released clues - no progress

5. Wild and Goosey: Continue making green blocks ✔

Honestly not as bad as expected, check marks on three out of five isn't horrible.  Keeping up with the Guild BOM was my priority for last week. As long as that happened, it would be a good week.  This week's list will be a bit shorter. I've decided to just collect the clues for the Bonnie Hunter mystery this year. Maybe after Christmas, or more likely after New Year's, I'll decide to make it or not.  There is much more sewing time in January than December, so we'll see.  That means this week's list is a bit shorter than it has been. 

To Do List for 12/16/2025

1. My Girl Trivet: Quilt the kitty trivets

This will be the first thing I work on when I make it to the sewing room. I'm hoping the two trivets won't take that long.  Famous last words, hopefully I'm not sabotaging myself.  

2. 2026 Guild BOM: Start February block

The January block is finished and I got started on the border blocks, which are actually block 12. But as the final quilt needs so many of them, I'm giving the guild members the option to make a few each month and be ready for assembly when we get to next December.  I've got the instructions drafted for the February block. I just need to get started on it.  

3.  Magnificent Mystery (Meadow Mist Designs): Work on Oct/Nov/Dec clues

There's been at least some progress on all the clues. September is completely finished with good progress on October and November. Still a long way to go with December's clue.  

4. Wild and Goosey (Bonnie Hunter): Continue making green blocks

There's been progress on this front, but still a number of green ones left to make. The plan was to be done in December. That might not happen, but I'm happy with the progress. 

A much shorter list this week, but that fits my available time better.  Linking up with the Quilt Schmilt for To Do Tuesday, just on Wednesday.