FFOctober! Join me...

   Okay, I've found myself in the usual situation of working for less and less time each on more and more projects-- now nothing is getting done on everything! It's October 1st-- a great time of year  to look back on our 2023 goals and/or plan Christmas stitching-- if you have a blog-- that's easily done-- I took a look back at my first post of the year.

    

  So I was supposed to making monthly goals, not yearly ones-- I honestly haven't done that. I am really satisfied with my sewing accomplishments this year, but still want to finish strong. I also said I was going to add monthly finishes to my the 2023 tab above-- I made it to February--hee-hee. I may correct that and fill in some of the blanks before the end of the year.. I think I was getting frustrated with that, because early in the year, a lot was held up on the quilting step. AARTI is still not at the long armer's but is a finished top. And I hate to say, I never finished quilting my Winter Twist project-- what better time than now? And the Barn Star Sampler has only one block done to show for the year! LOL. But why be negative-- it's a beauty!

   Best news of all-- I did commit to making something from ALL the Sew Sampler boxes this year-- I also decided to do the specialty boxes as well-- Cupid, Liberty, Spook, and Jolly boxes. That will be 16 finishes for the year. Many of them are still going through the pipeline-- and that is what's contributing to having a ton of things in various stages to work on right now. I think the plan this month is to just do one thing at a time and try to close out as many as I can. Here goes!

1. Oddly, I'm starting with a new project-- the September Sew Sampler Box just came in and I need to make something ASAP. Because then the Spooky Box is right on top of it. The September box fabric is a junior jelly roll-- not my favorite precut-- but I love the fabric-- Dawn on the Prairie by Fancy That Designs. So rustic and autumnal!

     

   When I read my original Sew Sampler Challenge, I was supposed to  just use the box fabric and stash. I discovered I hate my stash-- it's very dated. So a lot of new matching designer fabrics have been purchased and the challenge has gotten a bit pricey. I can avoid this in the future by picking patterns that don't use background fabric-- for this month's junior jelly roll, I found this free pattern by Material Girl-- it uses the entire jelly roll of 24 strips and I will have a nice set of 12 blocks. I'd love to bang this out in a day. Mr. SFO is traveling again this week (sigh), so I am going to try! (Click the photo to go to the Material Girl tutorial, if you are interested in an easy way to use up your detested jelly rolls.)

2. Neighbor #5-- I was able to get two blocks out of my kit almost!-- thank you, Fat Quarter Shop! Just want to get borders and embroidered "Welcome" on them. Then they go in the "To Be Quilted" pile for another little more marinating. Actually, now that there's two of them, I may send them out for quilting, when I see the extent of this finishing list!

3. Resilient Quilt-- I had fun making the blocks but I now need to add a border and piece the backing. Fun, fun... my least favorite part of quilt-making! Excited to gift this to a new baby girl-- it's ending up a little big for a baby quilt?

4. Corn Pop Pillows-- this is slowly working along. I have already passed the gut wrenching moment when I had to cut the quilted pieces apart. And the pillow forms have arrived. Just finish it already. I am going to have an extremely dialed in living room this fall!  

5. Pressed Flowers Block 6-- this is a BOM program that comes in each Sew Sampler Box-- another thing I have amazingly kept up with. I'd really like to get Block Six done by the end of the month and stay on top.

6. Oval Table Runner-- my least favorite project this year. I need to cut it into the oval, and I made the template already, then it needs binding. I do have the fabric Where even is this thing? This is where it was last seen six weeks ago. Where did all those weeks go?

7. Mod Flower Box-- just needs a binding-- I got hung up on this when I had to order more of the navy fabric to bind, but it's here now. There it is, waiting patiently in a heap!

8. Tree Farm Table Runner. This kind of fell into a black hole while I worked on some more timely sets for San Fran. Very close to being finished, but still needs some effort... all lying in another heap!

9. Fruit Cocktail Table Runner-- sitting awaiting quilting for quite some time...  months, actually. There is the backing and binding fabrics all ready to go. This was the one I made to look like my favorite table runner ever from 2003 in a spring and summer version. I want to quilt it just like I did the first one, all those years ago. The Christmas version was on my table all summer, and may as well stay there at this point, oops!

10. Spooky Box. Dying to know what is in this, but no one is doing a spoiler. One photo I saw looked like another jelly roll-- I  hope not. Arrives Wednesday, and I need to dive in and get it done. Maybe I'll use the included pattern for once? The finishing kit on Fat Quarter Shop website is cheap, meaning a smaller piece, hopefully. (Update: I did see a SPOILER, it is another Jelly Roll, but the pattern is the cutest little ghosts ever, so I may make a run at it. Let's just hope there's not enough fabric to make two of them!)

 

* * . Summer Memories-- only 16 baskets to go-- I'm 3/4th of the way. This I don't want to keep working on till it's finished-- there's still too much to do-- so this one gets and asterisk, not a number. So I'll just continue to dabble it along until the baskets are finished-- should be able to easily do that by the end of the month.

    So that's the project run down for October. Phew! Eleven things! Not sure how it happened. I've ordered them in the most palatable fashion-- the goal is to check off one before the next one gets worked on. Join me! Make your list and let's have a great FFOctober!

xox

Carol