Spring is springing and that means life has most likely picked up! Are you behind on the Farm Girl Vintage 2 sew along?
Or maybe you have a different project you started on, but now the busier calendar of activities means you set it aside and now you don’t know how to pick it back up?
Below are 4 ways to combat your overwhelm and get you back on track!
PS: I needed this post for myself too 🙂
Remember the goal:
Why are you making this quilt or working on your particular project?
Are you gifting it to someone? Do you have plans to display it in your home? Did you choose this project for the challenge of it all?
We all had our individual reasons for signing up for this sew along.
Dig deep and remember yours!
Identify your road blocks:
Taking some time to remember your goal helps you get organized and motivated to continue on.
For me, one of my roadblocks was lack of time (and I knew this, so didn’t apply pressure on myself), but I also know that my roadblock was a SUPER messy sewing room.
I was knee-deep in chaos and it was not inspirational or motivational. Over the weekend I spent some time organizing and getting everything back to its rightful place.
It was so refreshing to see my space that I think even the house took a deep breath!
Break down the goal
Any large-scale goal needs to be broken down into manageable steps. Remember:
- Before you read a book, you read a page.
- Before you can run a marathon, you jog a mile.
- Before you lose 50 pounds, you start by losing 2.
Before you complete a large sampler quilt, you sew one block!
Small steps add up!
How about this week you set your intention to finish just one block. Heck, make it an easy one! Pick the block that only has a few pieces to cut and carve out 30 minutes to sew it together.
And if you want to super-motivate yourself, pull out all of the blocks you completed so far and hang them up as inspiration!
It might be just the thing you need to keep going.
Embrace imperfection
Piecing your quilt can be a daunting task and I’ve never heard a quilter say they are in love with their seam ripper.
Sewing together the intricate pieces involved in the Farm Girl VIntage 2 quilt can be daunting and sometimes the blocks just don’t turn out as planned. Take a look at the grass underneath my truck. I cut it incorrectly TWO MONTHS AGO!
I need to rip it. Fix it. Move on.
But other fixes aren’t so easy. The tiny pieces can stretch and warp. Quarter-inch seams can go rogue. Pieces fray after they’ve been pulled out with a seam ripper several times (believe me – the tomato stems on the Corn & Tomatoes block were not my friends!)
In the end, sometimes we just need to pick up and move up. Embrace the imperfection of it all.
Unless you plan to enter this quilt into some county fair contest, can you live with a tomato stem upside if it means the block is finished and you can move on to the next?
You know, they say that Amish quilters hide a mistake in ever quilt they do. Maybe it’s time to channel your inner Amish and go ahead and just say that “imperfectly complete is better than nothing at all.
I hope these 4 tips helped you to get back on track!
I love seeing your progress if you’re willing to share! You can still join the Facebook group or post on Instagram too! Let’s all commit to catching up!
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