Welcome to the first Saturday Quilting Bring & Share of 2025. I hope you will scroll through my blurb and enjoy exploring the links into our Worldwide Quilting Community. Leaving a message in the comments box at the end of the blog post you read will make the writers day and help to foster the community!
The first SQBS for quite some time, if truth be told…. Slowly, slowly I am regaining my laptop mojo, adjusting my thinking around sewing from business mindset, returning to hobbyist enthusiasm. It is taking longer than I expected to relax back into patchwork-quilting. Last year whilst I was, on the whole, enjoying time spent sewing most of my projects were on my general to-do list, with deadlines attached, along with housework tasks and all the other weekly activities. Patchwork-quilting revolved around preparing for workshops and adding new listings to my Folksy shop. In October I took the decision to step out of striving to create a business around my hobby – I wrote about that decision at the time. In the weeks leading up to Christmas I had a great urge to finish some of the UFOs around me. I went with that and also completed a few extra projects including a couple of tree skirts and then a lap quilt each for my parents, I even had a stall at a Christmas fair. Over the holiday season I enjoyed completing my 2024 Rainbow Scrap Challenge quilt AND decluttering my sewing room.
‘Rainbow Pyramids’ my 2024 RSC quilt.
I’ve selected my first quilt of 2025 to be an Elizabeth Hartman design, ‘Cats in Space’. I had it in mind to make this as a sample for the shop… Immediately I attached deadlines… I have had to make a determined effort to shake off the ‘got to do it’ attitude, giving myself permission to relax into this project.
One of the four out of this world felines floating around on my design wall.
Thankfully the self-imposed deadline slipped and has now disappeared. I am enjoying this project for what it is, my hobby!
And to tune in with rediscovering sewing as my hobby I’ve come up with a rather frivolous Word of the Year: FUN! It does sound a bit superficial but it is the word I’ve chosen to encapsulate my fresh attitude to patchwork-quilting rather than life in general! (I’m much too serious minded to seek fun for funs sake!).
Here are the links into our Worldwide Quilting Community:
Are you feeling the need to declutter your sewing space? Karen’s annual Declutter Challenge series is a great way to focus on key areas one at a time. It’s not too late to join in or perhaps you are already diligently following the programme?
Kristina has released a new box pouch pattern, The Foxboro Pouch. To celebrate she will be running a sew-along with lots of tips to help even newbies create successful mini-bags. The sew-along takes place week beginning 20th January.
And talking of pouches… Here’s a great way to use up a stash of 2½” squares and add extra detail to a patchwork by using binding as an embellishment. Krista’s use of simple quilting and the binding strips really does add a fresh look to basic patchwork squares, taking bag or placemat design to another level 🙂
Cheree has nailed her 2025 project list to the mast of her blog, so to speak. I’m particularly taken with the Christmas tree quilt patterns she has on her to-do list and the plaid quilt too – it looks so warm and comforting. Do you set out your project goals for the year or do you lean the opposite way, just working on what takes your fancy as the year goes by?
Katy is a prolific quilter, still producing a large number of finished quilts in 2024 despite it being the year she and her hubby sold their house and moved from Michigan to Arizona (snow to cacti!). In this post Katy shares the baby quilts she made in 2024. Lots of her patchworks start life as fabrics or unfinished projects picked up in thrift stores.
Happy Stitching!
It’s good to be back, Allison 🙂
Fun is not a frivolous word, Allison! Fun is necessary, and can be a frivolous activity! You’ve worked hard at a business and forgot how to have fun, and now you will have an entire year to learn how to connect with your free spirit, or inner child, as some call it. I had forgotten how to have fun, too, but I have been learning. It would be nice if I would learn faster, but progress to that end is still progress! I like picnics, so I hope to experience more of those this coming summer. That would be fun for me! But we are also talking about quilty goals. Last year, I had a list for the entire year, and I did accomplish most of it. This year, no list, other than to sew scrappy and use up fabric stash. No deadlines, no must do ufos, etc…. The hard part will be the internet. Oh, yes, all those wonderful BOMs and QALs and the inspiration from everyone else’s projects! This has already been challenging for me, and the year has just begun! I am hoping to keep myself unattached if I can so that I do my own thing. We will see! 🙂
Thanks so much for your insight and understanding Laura. Strange how we are having to (re)learn how to have fun! Picnics would be on my list of fun activities to look forward to too! My husband and I are much too inclined to get on with the to-do list, forgetting to take advantage of his switch to part-time flexible working – a perfect set-up for making the most of good weather and going out for the day.
And I’m definitely getting more relaxed about NOT pushing forwards my patchwork quilting project when really I’d rather be doing a puzzle or cross stitch or, indeed, reading blog posts! Please do watch out for the appearance of my ‘fun’ meme in future posts. If you don’t see it often enough, give me a nudge!