Sunday, September 24, 2006

The unending problem of UFO'S

One of my quilting challenges is the huge mountain of UFO's that live in my basement cupboards. Some quilters call them WIP's (works in progress), which has a more positive energy than UFO (Un Finished Objects)...as if a WIP is still being worked on, and will be finished any minute now. But my UFO's are really just unfinished and not being worked on, and sitting in a cupboard, box, or bag.
Two years ago I joined the UFO club at my local quilt guild and this has been wonderful for my UFO pile. Each September we make a list of the projects we would like to finish, one for each month of the quilting year. We bring the UFO's to the first meeting, where we take each one out and show it to the group (8 brave quilters). Everyone "ooohh's and ahhhh's" over the projects and we remember why we started it in the first place and then we hopefully fall in love with the idea of finishing the quilts so they can be used and enjoyed, instead of sitting in a closet.
In the first year, I finished 6 quilts. In the second year, I finished 7 quilts. Here is one of my finished UFO's:

This quilt is made from blocks exchanged in a Quiltbee block swap, made and exchanged by quilters named Kathy/Cathy or some variation of this name. It was lots of fun and I enjoyed the swap. However, then the blocks sat in a bag in my cupboard for years. Finally, with the encouragement of the UFO group, I sewed the blocks together and quilted it. It is about 30" square and is a nice autumn wallhanging. In case you were wondering, my block is the 3D bowtie block in the bottom row. On the back of this quilt, I appliqued the signature squares behind each of the blocks.

So, now it is time to create my UFO list for the new quilting year. I have to select 8 projects from the cupboard. I never include smaller/mini projects on this list...only wallhangings and bed size quilts. I have two quilts that have been on previous years lists and are still unfinished...you can imagine how much I hate those UFO's!! They will top the list again this year, so now I just have to pick 6 more...no problem!

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