New Year – New Theme – New Goals

Happy New Year! Can you believe we’re already a new decade in this century?! It seems like all the Y2K commotion was just a couple of years ago. It’s amazing to realize it’s been 10 years already. Where does the time go?!

As you can tell, the new year has also brought a new theme for my blog. After years of blogging, I finally found what I believe to be the perfect theme for my blog. This is so “me” that it’s unbelievable. What you think?

As I’ve been reading everyone’s blogs over the past couple of days, I’ve been seeing lots of people posting a recap of their 2009 goals and setting new goals for 2010. This left me wondering if I actually set any goals for 2009. It’s probably not a good sign that I didn’t even actually remember, eh?

As it turns out, it looks like I only set one stitching-related goal for 2009 which is a little surprising. Unfortunately, I didn’t even meet the one. Oops! The goal was to keep my WIP list down to 15 or less, but it’s currently sitting at 19. Maybe this year.

2009 Recap:

*As far as projects moved to UFO, I borrowed a concept from Annette. If I haven’t worked on a project in the preceding 12 months, I’m no longer considering it a WIP (work in progress), and will move it to UFO (unfinished object) status instead. This doesn’t mean that I won’t eventually finish it, but if I haven’t worked on it in over a year, I just can’t justify in my head calling it a WIP any longer.

Here is a list of all the finishes I had during 2009:

1. Snowman’s Quaker Christmas (Midnight Stitching) – Completed 1 Feb 2009
2. NEEDLE heART (Margaret Bendig) – Stitching cruise piece – Completed 8 Feb 2009
3. Christmas Joy (Little by Little Design Co.) – Completed 25 April 2009
4. Rosemarkie (Long Dog Samplers) – Completed 29 April 2009
5. Rudolph (The Stitcherhood) – Completed 2 May 2009
6. Boo (The Stitcherhood) – Completed 3 May 2009
7. Letters from Nora – Madeline Melissa (Nora Corbett) – Completed 27 May 2009
8. Ink Circles May 2007 freebie – Completed 7 June 2009
9. Spooky Treats (Part 1 of 6 of Lizzie Kate’s Boo Club) – Completed 11 June 2009
10. Anonymous RAK – Completed 25 June 2009
11. Patriotic Quaker Heart – Completed 27 July 2009
12. Multiplicity – Completed 14 August 2009
13. Hagatha’s Slipper (part 1) – Completed 11 September 2009
14. Boo to You House (Fair & Square exchange) – Completed 10 October 2009
15. West Coast (Sea to Shining Sea series) – Completed 19 October 2009
16. Moon Witch – Completed 4 November 2009
17. Noel Naturally – Completed 5 November 2009
18. Joyful Night- Completed 14 November 2009
19. Indian Summer – Completed 25 November 2009

2010 Goals:

1. StRIP (Stash Reduction Implementation Plan)

This is the year that I really want to get my WIP list under some semblance of control. I know that I give this goal a bit of lip service every year, but I’ve never really followed through on it. This year is going to be different!

How am I going to accomplish this task you ask? My rule for 2010 is that I can’t start a new project until I complete at least three existing projects. I do have a few exceptions to this rule:

1. Little House Needleworks ornament of the month series
2. Exchanges
3. Class projects (probably only the Shepherd’s Bush retreat this year)
4. Guilt-free January (GFJ)

For those who aren’t active on stitching message boards, the concept of GFJ is that one is allowed to start as many new projects as they like, free of any guilt about existing WIPs or UFOs, during the month of January. I have decided to slightly modify GFJ and only allow myself this caveat during this first weekend of the new year. If it’s not started by 11:59pm on Sunday, January 3, then I can’t start it until after I have completed three other finishes.

The downside to this StRIP plan is that most of my current WIPs are BAPs (big ass projects), including several samplers. The upside is that now I’ll probably get some of them actually finished.

Once I have my WIPs under control, then I’ll work on coming up with a plan for the UFOs. I’m not even going to worry about them until I have my WIPs down to single digits.

2. Little House Needleworks Ornament of the Month series

I signed up with Drema for the automatics on this series a couple of months ago when Diane first announced it on the Little House Needleworks website. Since these are ornaments, they should be pretty quick stitches. My goal is to stay caught up on stitching this series throughout the year as they are released.

3. Stash Stitching

Along with trying to get my WIPs under control, I definitely want to get back to stitching from my stash again for my new starts. I have so many gorgeous pieces already, with probably about 40 already kitted even. I am always so tempted by the new pretties that come out that I end up buying more and more and then never get around to stitching them.

My goal for this year is that 80% of my new starts, excluding the LHN series and any class pieces, will come from my existing stash. Given my first goal, it’s unlikely that I’ll be able to have more than 5 or 6 new starts this year. By making the goal 80%, it does give me a little wiggle room for something that might be released that just screams at me to stitch it right away. ;)

As you can see, I have my work cut out for me this year with my goals. Wish me luck because I know I’ll definitely need it. I’m weak!

Until next time …