Happy New Year...

I've decided this year that I need to get back into setting some goals for myself for getting some projects finished. I have more UFO's around here than I care to count, and I really don't want to know just how many there really are. I've listed 10 on my side bar that I would like to get finished, at least to the flimsy stage, this year, and hopefully to the quilted and bound stage. I am finding that, as a long arm quilter for other people, my own projects get shunted to the side. So, this year, I am going to actually book in my own quilts. I'm going to make a loose schedule of which quilts get done when, and add my own in.
For January, my finish it goal is this poor neglected quilt. It is a Judy Martin design called Thanksgiving, from her book Patchwork Among Friends. It has been hanging like this on my design wall since the November sew-in day for the guild. I would like to get this quilt finished to at least the flimsy stage by the end of the month. There are 60 more leaf blocks needed to finish the borders. I think I have about 20 of them done, so getting it to the flimsy stage is do-able.

And I did make my goal of starting a new project for the new year, a January Newfo.

These are the first five blocks for the quilt Three of a Kind, a pattern by Judy Martin in her book Scraps. This is actually the third quilt I've started from this book. One of them is finished, the other is on my UFO list for finishing this year. I'm going to continue on this for the rest of today, using parts of the leaf blocks as leaders and enders when needed. I think I am going to set myself another goal, that before I start another Newfo, I finish the first one I started. The exception to that is going to be in the Soscrappy rainbow scrap challenge I'm thinking of adding a couple more scrap using projects that get done a bit at a time, in order to meet another of my goals for this year, which is using up my overflowing boxes of scraps. I started last year on these blocks and I am going to continue with these blocks. But they end up not really using scraps, but have to be cut from fat quarters. So, I think I am going to do some churn dash blocks, that will finish at 6 inches, and some bow tie blocks in 2 sizes, 3 inch finished and six inch finished. I've seen a couple of quilts made from these units in one of my books, and doing them just a few at a time, shouldn't be that bad. I still have to figure out how many of each colour I will need in order to end the year with finished tops. And that's it.... my goals for this month, and the coming year. I'm linking up to the goal setting party for A Lovely Year of Finishes. I'm hoping this will give me the added oomph I need to get this done.