Tag Archives: UFO

Quilting on the Kitchen Table – Just Roll with It

There is no need to keep reminding me

When I was a kid, the kitchen table was the hub of our home. Of course, we enjoyed all of our meals there, but countless other activities took place as well. Homework, science projects, model building, and craft projects of all kinds shared this space. Sewing projects, on the other hand, were the stuff of the living room floor. It was carpeted, plenty big enough and, as my mom would have it, immaculately clean.

Now that I’m running my own home, the living room floor is neither big enough nor clean enough to host a sewing project, so kitchen table it is. But what happens when it’s dinnertime and your project is not even close to being done? In Mom’s house, the table was always to be cleaned off minutes before 6pm, whether you were done with that model volcano or not. At my house, I can be more flexible but still, that quilt is at least two more weeks (or more?) in the making. What to do?

Eating in the living room is always an option, but in the instance that more civility is required, try just rolling it up! Start by laying down a tablecloth before you begin your project. Not the good one for holidays, the simple cotton one that won’t mind getting poked with pins. When it’s time to claim your table back, fetch one of your wrapping paper tubes – one of the big 4’ ones. It’s OK if it’s still covered in wrapping paper. You can still use that later. Start at the short end of the tablecloth and just roll your quilt up around the tube, with all your project pieces laid out on the tablecloth just as they are. Be sure to take out any quilt rulers first! Now stash the roll out of sight until your next spate of quilting. When unrolled your project will be relatively unwrinkled and all the pieces will be laid out just as you had them!

 

Can’t Seem to Finish That Quilt

None of these quilts are finished.

Like many quilters, I have an abundance of unfinished quilting projects. I feel really bad about this state of affairs. Guilt about unfinished projects even robs me of enthusiasm for starting a new project and often leaves me stuck not working on any quilt. We quilters inevitably laugh the problem off, even making jokes about how many unfinished projects we have, although I’m sure we all want to find a way to finish our quilts. Let’s take a look at some of the causes for quilt-procrastination and think about what can be done:
• Lack of motivation: Quilting is a time-consuming and often challenging hobby, so it’s important to have a strong motivation to finish each project. If you’re not feeling motivated, it can be hard to muster the energy to complete a quilt. The best way I’ve found to re-kindle motivation on a lagging project is to hang whatever you have done so far on a wall, take a step back and really appreciate what you have accomplished to date. Try to envision how beautiful it will be when it’s fully done. This simple technique always lights a spark under my sewing needle.
• Perfectionism: Quilters tend to be a very precise lot and often strive for perfection in their work, but this can be a double-edged sword. If you’re constantly trying to be perfect, you may endlessly agonize over the smallest detail and drag the production time out to eternity. Try to remind yourself that imperfections are part of the beauty and uniqueness of handmade quilts.
• Lack of time: Quilting can be time-consuming, which is especially problematic if you also have a job or kids, or both! Try breaking your quilting projects into smaller, more manageable steps that you can work on a little bit at a time. This can help you make progress even if you only have a few minutes here and there. Be sure to keep all the parts for one project together in a bag or storage container so you don’t waste valuable project time searching for your quilt parts.
• Overcommitment: If you have too many quilting projects going on at once, it can be overwhelming and make it difficult to finish any of them. It would be easy to say, “Limit yourself to one or two projects at a time”, but all quilters know that is near impossible. I find it more realistic to try to finish ONE thing from your unfinished projects pile before bringing something new into the queue.
Remember that quilting should be a fun and rewarding hobby, so try not to get too bogged down in the details. If you’re struggling to finish a quilt, take a step back and evaluate why you’re struggling, then try to make some adjustments to help you move forward.

Top 5 Excuses for Projects I Won’t Finish

Quilters, sewists and crafters alike all suffer from an abundance of unfinished projects. We feel really guilty about it and struggle against it as if it were a rip tide, often to no avail. The causes of the stacks of uncut fabric and the bags of partially sewn treasures are many.  Here are the:

Top 5 Excuses for Projects I Won’t Finish

  1. It’s too difficult – As an accomplished seamstress who has been sewing long before prom dresses had poofy sleeves, you will never hear me use this excuse. For me, no project is too difficult, so I’ll have to move on to one of our other excuses.
  2. It went out of fashion – I know this excuse sounds hard to believe, but it happens more than you might think. Back in college, my sewing bestie and I decided to make sexy knit dresses that were basically a tube dress with a wide off the shoulder band. We trekked down to Boston’s Chinatown, where all the good fabrics stores used to be, and bought bright 80’s knitted prints for what we were calling our “She-Woman” dresses. Neither of us started sewing the dresses for several years. In our defense, we were both undergraduates at M.I.T. and thus were kinda busy. My friend eventually made her dress, but I never did. At least two decades passed, both the dress pattern and the print became hopelessly out of date, and I ended up giving the fabric away.
  3. I ran out of fabric – Running out of fabric is a very good excuse for not finishing a project. Sometimes, this excuse can be mitigated by searching online for just a little bit more of the fabric in question. Both eBay and ETSY are great places to start. You can even use Google reverse image search to find a matching swatch!
  4. I don’t have time – This is both a common and very sad reason for not finishing a project. After sewing for decades and always having a heinously demanding day job, my best advice to ameliorate this unfortunate condition is to make sewing a priority. Don’t wait for the dishes to be done and the laundry sorted before you will allow yourself sewing time! Sew first, do household chores later.
  5. Shiny! Shiny-object syndrome is quite assuredly the number one reason I continue to stockpile unfinished projects. Something pretty and distracting (i.e., “shiny”) will pop up on my Instagram feed and I simply must make it as soon as possible. I always tell myself, “I won’t start a new project until I finish something I’m currently working on”. Predictably, this never works. My best recommendation for combatting this syndrome is to get together with your other sewing friends and have a “finish it up” challenge whereby all participants agree to complete one UFO (un-finished object) by a specified date. You can then move on to the new project with slightly less guilt!