2017 Crafty Plan – Recap

2017 is over and as with every year, I wanted to review and reflect on how things went for my crafty life this year.  I planned to post this at the end of the year but came down with a bad cold. 

 I started the year a bit rough with things not so great on the work front.  That forced things on the crafty side to grind to a screeching halt.  And I started the year without a plan of action.  As a result, I didn’t create a plan until February.  It wasn’t that late but I felt ill prepared for the year and I never felt as if I ever truly caught up.  In fact, my whole quilty life took a back seat as I fell in love with knitting and yarn.  I didn’t stop quilting as I did get stuff finished but not nearly as much as I did in previous years.  Oh well, life is an ebb and a flow and I am enjoying the ride.

And here’s my 2017 crafty plan and how I did …

  1. Quilting
    1. Finish 6 quilts == I finished 3 and they were Missing Ivy, Baby Quilt #1 for Mason, and Baby Quilt #2 for Averlee.  
      1. Missing Ivy
      2. Celtic Solstice
      3. Have yourself a quilty Little Christmas
      4. Raining Cats and Dogs
      5. Provence (2012 LQS BOM
      6. Area One Quilter’s Run
      7. Scrapitude 2016
      8. Asian (2012 LQS BOM #2)
  2. Knitting
    1. Sweater “Kimono” – FINISHED
    2. Socks – 12 for the year.
    3. hat – 1 for each family member – I THINK I GOT ONE DONE FOR JACOB AND HE NEVER WORE IT SO I STOPPED.  LATER I DID ONE FOR ME THAT KAYLA LIKED.  I LIKE HAT KNITTING WITH CHUNKY YARN AS IT GOES BY FAST.  SO I THINK I’LL HAVE ONE ON THE NEEDLES AT ALL TIMES.  
    4. car knitting – Jacob’s beanie – DONE
    5. Use yarn stash (which as of 2/15/17, the following are being knitted from stash: 2 socks, Jacob’s beanie, Rikke hat for me or Kayla.) – NOT DONE. FOR 2018 I WOULD LIKE TO MONITOR THE NUMBERS SIMILAR TO HOW I MONITOR MY FABRIC STASH.  I TRIED DOING THIS Sometime BEFORE AND THEN STOPPED.  I AM GOING TO TRY AGAIN. 
  3. Cross Stitching – continue working on Mama’s Bukid each week.  DONE. I’M WORKING ON PAGE 5.  I CALCULATED THAT IT WILL TAKE ME YEARS TO FINISH BASED ON HOW LONG IT TOOK ME TO FINISH PAGE 1.  I THINK BECAUSE OF THAT, I STARTED WORKING ON THIS MORE DILIGENTLY AND I’M GETTING THROUGH PAGE 5 MUCH FASTER.  
  4. Bag Making – I DID GET A BUNCH OF BAGS DONE EARLIER IN THE YEAR AND I TOOK SOME CLASSES AT MY LQS AS WELL.  I FEEL LIKE I AM ABLE TO DO THIS MORE COMPETENTLY BUT I NEED TO DEVOTE TIME TO ACTUALLY DO SOME WORK.  I GAVE MOST OF THE BAGS I MADE AWAY AND I NEED TO MAKE MORE.  I LIKE HAVING THEM TO GIVE AWAY WHENEVER I NEED SOMETHING HANDY. 
  5. Clothes – I want to start learning how to sew garments.  I’m not sure how or where to start so I guess my first step is to find an easy project to start learning on.  I STARTED AND THEN I STOPPED.  I GOT OVERWHELMED. I HAVE A FRIEND WHO WANTS TO LEARN THIS YEAR SO HOPEFULLY WE CAN FIND A CLASS TO TAKE. 

And my overarching non-craft specific goals:

  1. use what I have
    1. my fabric stash
    2. my yarn stash
    3. my tools
  2. Get rid of the things that I don’t love anymore
    1. sell
    2. donate
    3. throw away
  3. Watch my spending
  1. only buy things I will use now

I really like this but didn’t fully implement these overarching values on to my monthly or weekly tasks so I wasn’t very good at remembering these. In fact in reviewing my 2017 plan I saw this and loved the simplicity of it. I know it’s going to be harder to follow as I’ve bought a lot of fabric and yarn this year and have not used as much as I would like. 

Now that I’m feeling better, I’ll finalize my 2018 crafty plans!  

Stay tuned!

Happy crafting… 

~Melanie

 

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