My New Year's Challenge!

I've been thinking a lot about things I'd like to do differently in 2014. Historically, I'm awful at keeping new year's resolutions, but I have found I'm somewhat more successful when I challenge myself to do something. In the past, I've challenged myself to run marathons, enter quilting contests, and take classes and job positions that were way out of my comfort zone. Earlier this year, I signed up to help out with our elementary school PTA Reflections contest. Somehow I ended up having to do the whole thing by myself. Without any previous experience with the Reflections contest, I felt extremely overwhelmed. In the end, things came together. I had wanted to quit so many times, but I was glad I stuck with it. After I finished I actually said out loud to myself, "I can do hard things!"

One of the things that I'd like to do more of in 2014 is recording life. When I was a teenager, I faithfully wrote in my journal every day. Then I had kids, life got busier, and sleep was more important than writing. Almost 18 years later, life is still busy. My baby will be 1-year-old next month and she is getting very mobile. Sometimes I find myself wishing she was past this stage where every waking minute is spent in exploration. It's exhausting for me! But one thing my older kids have taught me is how quickly they grow up. I only have one year left with my oldest, then she's off to college! In some ways it seems like it was just yesterday that she was getting mobile and exhausting me with her exploration. But honestly, I can't remember a lot from my older kids' baby days. That is why I want to do more life recording this year. The older I get, I'm sure the less I'll be able to remember, so I need to record life now!

Blogging is a hard thing for me. I started this blog to allow my quilting clients a place to go see examples of my work. I'm not sure how useful its been in that respect. So I've decided to make this blog as much for me as for my work.

So here's my challenge to myself:

There are 50 weeks left in 2014, so I challenge myself to 50 posts this year. That's one post per week. I feel that is doable for me. And at the end of 2014, I'm really hoping I can look back and say, "I can do hard things!"

Now for quilting...

I have a lot of quilting pics to catch up on posting.

The first is this beautiful sunflower table mat made by my mother-in-law. We had fun picking out the fabric for this during shop hop last summer.

And check out this adorable fall quilt made by my friend Sylvia!

I still need to upload pics from five other quilts, so check back in a week or less! 

And Happy 2014 to YOU!