If you’re on a mission to complete your UFOs (Unfinished Objects) and Sewing Projects, you’ll love this blog!

Welcome to 2018!

It’s overwhelming to think about how fast time flies; it seems like this year has flown by so fast. However, I know it’s good to keep busy, and life certainly keeps me busy!

Like most of you, I enjoy setting goals for the new year – and often find myself doing this several times a year just to stay on top of things.

For 2018, I decided to set a goal to work on my UFOs. Those of you that sew a lot probably know what that stands for – UnFinished Objects!

If you are a sewer or crafter of any kind, you probably have a few UFOs of your own hanging around.

I hate to admit it, but I have quite a few. In fact, I have three big bins marked “UFOs #1,” “UFOs #2,” and “UFOs #3.” However, what’s worse is I’m sure there are more than that!

Interestingly enough, most of these projects only needed a small amount of work to be completed.

So here are my goals for my UFOs:

    • Figure out how many UFOs I actually have.
    • Set a deadline to finish them.
  • Get to work on getting them done.

So here is my start…

In UFO bin #1, I found four different projects to complete. Luckily, they were easy to finish and fun to work on!

Project #1:  My sister sent me a pattern for what I call a “snap bag.” Many of my sewing students have made them over the years. I love them, and they are fast and easy to make.

One of my sewing students gave me this fabric. It was leftover from one of her previous projects, and I had enough to make two.

What makes them snap is metal measuring tape, cut into 8 inch pieces. One was already done, and the other one took me just 10 minutes to complete! Here is the finished product:

Project #2: This project entailed finishing a small and cute drawstring bag. Again, a student had given me this small piece of fabric, and I had wanted to use it to make a bag to put my shoes in so I could put it in my suitcase while traveling to and from my mom’s house in Idaho.

This project was almost done – it took me just 5 minutes to finish! I love the fabric, and I know my shoes will be happy when I travel.

Project #3: My daughter decided that the colors of her new kitchen would be green. So I made her an apron, and started a table runner in that color. And then she changed her color to turquoise.

As you can imagine, I never finished the table runner. However, I realized her dining room table is separate from her kitchen, and the colors in the room are fairly generic. So I decided to finish it.

The runner just needed to be machine-quilted and edge-finished. This project only took me about 30 minutes to complete. I gave the finished product to my daughter, and she loved it! Here it is:

Project #4: I made an advent calendar for my daughter years ago, and it just needed refreshing. Numbers had fallen off, and animals (and their eyes) had gone missing.

Thankfully, it’s much better now – it only took me about an hour to make it look like new again. Here’s the finished product:

There you have it! In a flash, I already have four of my UFOs finished.

So, my challenge to you (if you want to join me) is to start finding and finishing your own UFOs!

Sewing Tip: It can be so much easier to let UFOs intimidate me and to let them go unfinished. That’s because my brain often tricks me into thinking they’ll take WAY longer to complete than they actually do. But, as you can see, I finished all four projects in under two hours! My advice to anyone is simply to take courage and start the process of finishing your UFOs. You’ll likely be surprised at how fun they are to finish – and how little time it takes to do so!

Next month, I’ll let you know how well I did on completing my goals. Happy New Year, and good luck to those of you that choose to join me on my quest to conquer UFOs!

Happy Sewing!

JoLene