Happy New Year! What a year 2013 was! I was looking back through photos for the year and what went on in the sewing room. There were a lot of small finishes--many for the Senior Craft Shoppe--mug rugs, tablerunners, a small quilt for my Blogversary, some St. Paddy's day decorations--but all that sewing stopped when I went back to work full time in mid March after having been mostly unemployed for six months prior.
I did manage to kit up some of my unfinished BOM blocks from 2009's Moda Greenpiece project to work on during the bus ride. The next couple of months were pretty light for blog posts. April saw me working on two very different baby quilts, both of which were finished that month.
The remainder of the year was pretty slow in the finishes department. I made more mug rugs for a friend's daughter, worked on Greenpiece blocks and borders, made an embroidered pillow for my daughter, finished three larger quilts (one for my nephew's wedding gift), and one more baby quilt. And since June when we found out that we are going to be grandparents, there have been plans in the works for nursery projects. January is going to be a very busy month of finishing the baby quilt, making curtains and a bassinet liner, and whatever else comes up, all before the big event coming up late in February. So very excited!
Part of my sewing slump this year had to do with what I learned from my doctor in October: that I have an underactive thyroid gland--finally a reason to pin my constant fatigue to! It wasn't until November that I started to regain some of my energy after being on thyroid pills for a month, and was actually able to sew after work again. Up to that point I was so totally exhausted in the evenings that I wasn't doing anything.
As far as goals for this new year, I haven't picked a word for 2014 so much as a direction--follow through. Too often I adopt a "I'll do that later", when now is a perfectly good time and will be a lot less trouble while the idea is fresh or the task is at hand. Calendaring "personal sewing retreat" days once a month is also on my agenda, hopefully with my sister joining in. It is so much fun to sew with someone at last! She pushes me to keep going and I help her with rounding out her ideas.
To all of you who stuck with the past year's scanty blogging, I thank you and hope you'll continue to look in at what's going on here at Annie's Quilt Orts. May your 2014 be full of good things!
