2021 in Review

2021 In Review
Here are my accomplishments for 2021, followed by pictures and headings only. Details are in my past posts as indicated by a clickable completion date after each name. My own assessment of how well I met my 2021 goals is after the pictures of completions. 

2021 COMPLETIONS:

• 5 quilts
• 1 knitted item
• 10 home decor items
• 17 toys / cloth books 
• 12 project bags
• 12 Hang Your Quilt Day participations in lieu of quilt shows
• 22 masks
• 10 burp cloths
• 3 key fobs
• 0 pillowcases
• 0 blog books

5 QUILTS

It's A Party (2/19/21) ~ 48" x 48" - gift for baby Irene

Sunflowers 38½" x 53½" (7/16/21) - made from BOM

Counting Stuff 48"x48" (8/28/21) gift for baby twin M in OK

Going Places 48" x 48" (9/7/21) gift for baby twin R in OK

Halloween Mini-Mystery (11/2/21) 55" x 16"

1 KNITTED ITEM

Vintage Christmas Stocking (10/6/21)  for baby Irene

10 HOME DECOR ITEMS

6 Halloween Kittens (10/24/21) for Dan, Carrie, Vivian, Lillian, William, Irene

1 Grey Spiral Table Runner (11/26/21) for Robin and Jeremy

1 Vegetable Spiral Table Runner (12/26/21) for Anna O.

2 Pair of Christmas Elves with pet penguins and polar bears (12/16/21) for OKC & SoCal families
(16 stuffed items + 4 hats + 2 skirts) 

16 TOYS

Family of Six (1/14/21) for Southern California grandkids

1 Roméo mouse rattle (3/10/21) for granddaughter Irene

Hello Little One cloth book (4/11/21) for Irene

Meet the Dinosaurs cloth book (8/6/21) for Gavin

2 bear quilt pillows (front and backs shown) and 2 bears with 2 blankets (9/23/21)

2 Tea Towel Operation Pillows (10/23/21) for 2 grandkid households

12 HANG YOUR QUILT DAY

Third Saturday of January (1/16/21)

Third Saturday of February (2/20/21)

Third Saturday of March (3/20/21)

Third Saturday of April (4/17/21)

Third Saturday of May (5/15/21)

Third Saturday of June (6/19/21)

Third Saturday of July (7/17/21)

Third Saturday of August (8/21/21)

Third Saturday of September(9/18/21)

Third Saturday of October Alternative (11/3/21)

Third Saturday of November (11/20/21)

Third Saturday of December (12/18/21)

MASKS

22 masks (3/1/21) for Southern California grandkids

12 Project Bags

7 project bags (in order for Lillian, Vivian, William, Dan, Carrie, Irene, Maxine) (4/9/21)

4 project bags (in order for Isaiah, Jeremy, Autumn, Robin) (6/6/21)

1 project bag (for Liz) (6/15/21)

10 Burp Cloths

10 Burp cloths (8/5/21)  for Gavin Ch.

3 Key Fobs

2 with Tula Pink Linework (7/15/21) for John and Marita 

1 with squirrels (7/15/21)  for Frank

Restatement of 2021 goals: I will become a closet quilter!

• I will make items from fabric and kits that are in my closet and tools that are in my drawers.
• While closeted away I will continue to interface remotely with the community.

Assessment of Goal Achievement:

Fabric usage:
I did complete a lot of the small projects that have been lingering in my drawers... Christmas elf panels, velvet fox toys, mouse rattle, and cloth books. I used up a lot of fat quarters for masks and spiral table runners and project bags. I made progress on decreasing my flannel stash for burp cloths. I made up two kits I had bought at a guild auction for twin boys and dove into my stash for the backing. I consumed a layer cake for a quilt for a new granddaughter. (OK. I did cave by buying matching backing fabric from the same product line online.) I used the fabric leftover from unsold blocks of the month and eked out a quilt, raiding my own stash fabric for the backing. I stitched up a Halloween mini-quilt with only fabric from my stash.

Tool and technique learning/practice:
The granddaughter quilt increased my skills with quilting circles and clamshells with a ruler template. I learned to make project bags, working with mesh, Soft and Stable, and bias binding. Making key fobs was a newly learned skill with hardware and specialty pliers.

Interfacing with community:

Guild meetings were by zoom and I did hang out my past quilts every third Saturday of the month. I wrote and published 43 blog posts. As I perused this list of 2021 completions I noted that except for a key fob for my husband, my halloween mini-quilt learning quilt a long, and the sunflower quilt using up the block of the month leftovers, I gave everything else away.

What I did not do:

I was surprised to realize I had made up no blog books in 2021. Year 2022 will be time to play catch up so I will watch for a sale at Blog2Print. Three kits a remain untouched in my closet. They are The Quilt Show Block of the Month project Color My World, Moda Halloween kit Midnight Crossings, and the Moda Christmas kit To Be Jolly. They were the leading items of my 2021 goal list so initially in this assessment post I was a bit bummed. But to be fair, I worded their completion in a wishy-washy way... "I will be pleased indeed if I accomplish". I will try again in 2022 with a firmer goal of completion of one of these at a minimum. At least these kits are well defined and pack away very compactly on my shelves.

Am I satisfied?

Yes. Looser, non-specific goals can still result in progress and growth. I will keep this in mind when I generate my 2022 quilting goals.