September's Accomplishments

Over the past few months, I've been slowly working out a system of goal-setting. All my life I've been terrible when it comes to actually accomplishing goals. As soon as I set one, I rebel against it and work on other things. I get NOTHING done and feel scattered all the time.

But I want to change, I want to be better. I want to actually finish the things I start. And with a little trial and error, I think I've finally found a plan that works for me.

The plan is as follows:

Each month I will identify one achievable quilting/sewing goal that I would like to accomplish by the end of the month. Most of the time the goal will be to finish a particular quilt but not always.

I'd also like to set one knitting/weaving goal to keep some projects moving along.

Once those items are finished, I'm free to work on anything I want for the rest of the month. It could be finishing old projects or starting new ones. If I drag my heels on my main goal, I won't have as much time to work on other things. It's a nice incentive to get to work!

I love this plan because the structure helps me focus and get things done while the flexibility allows me the space to feel creative. There are always going to be a million projects I "need" to finish but I don't have to feel obligated to finish them all at once. As long as I'm accomplishing my goals slowly and steadily, I will not feel bad for starting something new or for jumping from project to project.

I tested out this plan last month and here's how it went:

September's Goals:
Start and finish a Fly the Flag quilt
Finish my Happy Half Moon shawl

September's Accomplishments:
Started and finished my Fly the Flag Quilt (finished photos to come)
Completed two quilt tops: improv curves and Skull Sampler
Finished nine Moonrise Kingdom blocks
Cut an entire quilt's worth of 12" Glam Clams plus some bonus Drunkard's Path blocks
Finished and gifted one Jane Market Bag

September's Failures:
I knit only 3/4 of my Happy Half Moon shawl. I'm a little bummed about this because I wanted to keep up with knottygnome's knit-along. But in the end, I just couldn't do it. I can only knit so much before my wrist or shoulder hurts and I really didn't want to push myself too hard. That said, if I had worked on it a little every day, I would have finished. Let this be a lesson for next month: set a daily goal for projects that I'm struggling to work on.

So, that's it for September. A pretty successful month of work! October's goals will go up tomorrow. I can't wait!