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msmeow

QOTD 8/15 - follow up to clean slate thread

msmeow
11 years ago

After reading all the posts in the "If you had a clean slate..." thread, I got to wondering - why aren't we making any of these quilts? Why are they on the "someday" list but never on the NOW list?

I have a list on my bulletin board of my projects and there actually is a column titled "someday"...but whenever I need to start a quilt - for a gift or something like that - I don't even look at that list! I go to my pattern books and files and pick something else. It's often a pattern I've done before.

I don't know why I don't do any of the someday ones.

Donna

Comments (25)

  • calliope
    11 years ago

    I think you answered your own question. I have found quilters in general to be very giving and sharing people. They often..........actually usually.......put things like gifts ahead of quilts they'd like to keep for themselves. It would be hard to part with a quilt you'd been planning on doing for a long time. What if it ended up being a real bear and you never made another one? So, you put it off waiting for that special time when there are no gifts to be fashioned and you have time to relax and enjoy the experience. Only somebody gets pregnant without asking permission, LOL. Or somebody gets married, or retires. You know the dance.

  • nana_2009
    11 years ago

    I decided that there was no time like the present to make my french braid quilt...have to put one more strip on and then it is complete...not sure if I want to add a border or not...will post picture (if I can remember how to do it. I too have a list...not quilts to be made but quilt tops that need to be quilted and the order of importance to finish first...I may just have to put away the sewing machine and concentrate on quilting...good job for the long cold winter days and evening here in Manitoba

  • murphy_zone7
    11 years ago

    Good Question. Since quilting/sewing is THE fun activity in my world, I just seem to go by whim of the moment. Part of the fun is coming across new things. I have dozens of patterns that I want to make, just seems like something new comes along to attract my attention. And my plans just go out the window. For instance, for about a year or so I have been collecting fabric, planning how to do, and thinking that my next quilt will be the long desired "jar quilt" using fruit and veggie fabric. Last month I even found a pattern to use the leftover SCRAPS from said fabrics to make a table runner! Then I came across a new pattern and by coincidence or design (not sure which) saw a major sale on line for the perfect fabrics to make the new pattern.
    So now I have all I need to make the new pattern. So what do I work on yesterday???? New valance for my great room.
    I hear so many of my quilting friends talk about UFO's, I don't have any of those....but man I have about a half a dozen projects complete with fabric waiting patiently for me to make them. Maybe I should make a quilting schedule?

  • ritaweeda
    11 years ago

    Maybe all us quilters also have ADHD???
    Or, maybe when we set aside a dream of making a particular quilt "someday", we feel like if we do that is the end, we've achieved quilting "perfection" and have nowhere to go after that??
    I try not to be superstitious, but I've always admired the Lone Star quilt and planned to make one someday, then someone told me there's an old wives tale that if you start making one it will never get finished (told in an ominous tone). So I've made a one block mini just to test out that theory.
    And yes, often we are sidelined with gifts for someone else.
    Or perhaps we feel selfish to make something just for ourselves.
    Who knows, anyone who buys perfectly good yards of beautiful fabric and cuts it up into little pieces and sews it back together again has got to have some issues. LOL!!!

  • msmeow
    Original Author
    11 years ago

    LOL, Rita! I was thinking ADD as I read the posts, too. :) A couple of years ago we had a workshop on listening at work and one of my coworkers said she's like her dog. She said he's paying attention and then "Squirrel!" and he's off!

    I have sort of a schedule. The list of UFOs and projects on hand (ones ready to go - someday LOL) are in order from the ones I've had longest. I try to work on those in order, but like Calliope said, people go and get pregnant or married or something without asking permission! :)

    Donna

  • Robbi D.
    11 years ago

    I have about 3 long-term quilts that I'm working on at one time. And I made a promise to myself, I wouldn't start any others until they were finished. One is my Dear Jane and I'm happy to say, I'm at the half way point (on completing the top)!! The second one is my first quilt, a Baltimore Album (hand applique), and I need some opinions on how to arrange the blocks and fill in the empty spots. I thought I would bring it to the retreat and let you wonderful ladies help me get it all put together. The third is one I've used for fill-in work when I'm caught up on my Dear Jane (which hasn't happened in forever!!). I am over half way done on it, so maybe soon???? I will also be bringing it to the retreat.

    I like idea list on the bulletin board. I tend to forget about some of the ones I'd like to do, because there are sooooo many! Hmmmmmm......

    Robbi

  • magothyrivergirl
    11 years ago

    Robbi~I find the promises I make to myself are the easiest to break :) Definietely bring Jane and your BA to the Retreat!

    I am so fickle, I don't have a someday list. I do have UFO's and I do have books, and patterns. I am a better Goal Motivated person. Reasons to complete or make gifts gets me working......oh yeah work - it keeps getting in my quilting way!

  • karpet
    11 years ago

    I think for me, like several of you have said, life happens. A wedding, a baby, an illness, or a death. I also have some bit of an obsessive/compulsive streak where I set myself quilting challenges, and it is really hard to let go of them mentally and do something else. I feel 'obligated' to myself to finish whatever the challenge was.

    I do have a list of 'someday' patterns, and I have been using those as I make my different quilts, but there is a pile of patterns that are for me and it does feel selfish to make them for myself right now.

    Wonky - that is a work I learned on this forum and it describes my quilts and my thinking!

    Karlene

  • K8Orlando
    11 years ago

    Having just survived a few years of real financial distress with DH not working, bank accounts plummeting, etc. I think I felt guilty working on an expensive hobby if it was 'just for me'. But if it was a gift or a charity quilt, then there was no guilt. My personal projects kept taking a further and further back seat on the bus. Now I'm more restricted by time: if I'm sewing I'm not house cleaning or what ever. No guilt if I'm sewing for a Purpose, but guilt if it's a project for me with no deadline.

    But some of it is definitely The Squirrel Effect, as Donna mentioned: I am easily distracted by a new color, new pattern, new idea. And I'm easily put off by the idea of having to follow someone else's pattern so although I want to make Shakespeare, for example, I'm reluctant to actually pick it up and start. I'm afraid I'll get bored part way through and never finish it!

    Kate

  • nana_2009
    11 years ago

    Well here it is...now the question is... do I or don't I put on a border...

  • nannykins
    11 years ago

    Neato! as the kids used to say!
    How about more of that dark colour for a border separated by a very narrow strip of one of the lighter ones.
    I am sure you will get better ideas from the rest of the group.
    Theresa

  • loisflan
    11 years ago

    I think your quilt looks great just the way it is. But if you need extra width, a border would look good too. I like Theresa's idea of a narrow light border and wider outside dark border. Nice work!

  • nana_2009
    11 years ago

    I was thinking of a border of the of the lighter materials but not sure if there is enough to go around...maybe if I sew them together in strips similar to the braid...mmmm

  • K8Orlando
    11 years ago

    Gorgeous!!!

  • magothyrivergirl
    11 years ago

    I love it! Below is a link to many pictures of Braid quilts to look at for ideas on border or no border and what color and sizes.
    Yours is very, very pretty! Nice job-whatever you choose, it should enhance the pretty center.

    Here is a link that might be useful: Braid quilt pics

  • nanajayne
    11 years ago

    Very nice. I am fond of French Braids and I like the way you put them together.
    I think it would benefit from a border. Personally I would prefer the brown but one simular to the braid would be interesting. It is difficult to judge just from a picture.
    I am sure what ever you decide it will be wonderful. TFS

  • nana_2009
    11 years ago

    Thanks for all the ideas, the link to the pictures was super...I had very little of the materials left but managed to sew enough strips together and then cut 2 inch strips and added them as the border with 6 inches left over..the good Lord was on my side today. The picture is rather dark... the colours are actually pinks to dusty rose to burgundys with the centers as burgundy. I think the next one is going to be a kingsized one in varing shades of terra cottas to greens. I will post another picture this evening after I get the burgundy strips added to the edges..thanks again for all the comments...Val

  • nana_2009
    11 years ago

    Well here it is once again...complete with borders...now to figure out how to quilt it...

  • loisflan
    11 years ago

    Val, the borders are perfect! You did a wonderful job on the quilt. Lois

  • nannykins
    11 years ago

    EXcellent!
    Theresa
    PS I think I will put that on my to-do list.

  • murphy_zone7
    11 years ago

    nana....beautiful quilt. The borders are just right. Love those colors too.

    msmeow.....lol The Squirrel Effect, that is exactly my "issue" rather than ADHD or ADD although may have that along with OCD....good heavens, I'm a mess!
    its a wonder I ever get a quilt or anything else done. But Squirrel Effect sounds so much better, don't you think?
    Murphy

  • magothyrivergirl
    11 years ago

    Perfect border and best of all, it used up the extra fabric! Thanks!

  • msmeow
    Original Author
    11 years ago

    LOL, Murphy, I probably have the ADD/ADHD tendencies, but I KNOW I have OCD! I'd probably get a lot more quilting done if I didn't have to stop to put things away when I'm done with them, especially since it usually turns out that I'm not done with it after all. :)

    But I like the Squirrel Effect much better. Thanks, Kate!

    Donna

  • quiltingfox
    11 years ago

    Nana your quilt is beautiful and I love the pink. Calliope that's hilarious, but have to agree people do go getting pregnant without asking permission. And just when I think I have made all the baby quilts another cousin goes and gets married.

    I feel guilty making a quilt just for me as that means putting off making gifts for members of my family and I am the only one quilting in my family currently. I have 2 queen-size quilts currently in progress and have started buying fabric for 2 other queen-size quilts - all for family members. I worry that if I do start a quilt just for me I'll enjoy it so much that everything else will become UFO's. And I love pink, so I know the quilts I want to make for myself will be girly colors and hubby is not too thrilled about that and I also think of who am I going to pass "my" quilts onto that I keep for me and I only have a boy so I think he is going to want "guy" colors in a quilt. I want to know that if I make a quilt that it will be loved and used in the future. Once I get Grandma's queen-size quilt finished though, I think I will feel less guilty about starting blocks for me a quilt - though ssssshhhhh! don't tell hubby, he is wanting a paper-pieced "5 year" lighthouse quilt first.

    Well off to cut fabric for my Lotto block the only short-term project I am working on currently but it helps break up the monotony of other quilt projects and I keep thinking that if I do enough Lottos that one of these years I will have enough blocks to make a sampler quilt - and yes for me to keep, who am I kidding though it will probably turn into one of my family member's gift. :-)

    Best to you,
    Sandra

  • littlehelen_gw
    11 years ago

    Rita...LOL it's so true.....my issue is I buy fabric, love it and afraid of what will happen once I cut it...silly I know ...but the Squirrel effect is also sooo very, very true. My DH thinks I'm starting a side business w/ all the stash! My list of must do's continues to grow as I see lovely work of everyone else in the forum.
    Nana...Your quilt top is beautiful! I really like how you did the boarder...well done!
    Linda...do bring the Baltimore album quilt...love to see all your blocks...which brings to mind...Kate, Any more progress on your Baltimore album blocks? The blocks I've seen are truely awesome...that's a project that's not on my list of must do.
    V.

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