July Recap and August Goals

 My goals for July were:

The secret sewing project

✔1. Continue piecing blocks for the 2022 Temperature quilt. My order of the purple background fabric arrived on the day that I returned. My One Monthly goal is to attach all the blocks for July. This means I need to finish attaching June. 

The next "pile" marked for sorting

✔2. Write two more posts that feature book club quilts from the past. The books will likely be: The Guernsey Literary & Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer & Annie Barrows and The Midnight Circus by Erin Morgenstern. I'm close to documenting all the finished past book club quilts. My next step will be to begin finishing the book club quilts that I started but have let languish for one reason or another!

✔3. Write a post about the Ottolenghi we ate while we celebrated with the Queen during her Jubilee.  I ran out of weeks to post about this topic last month! 

✔4. Clean and organize the studio closet. Clear the cutting table in my studio. Originally, I planned to remove almost everything from my sewing space and start over. I thought a month would be enough time.

I realized the process will take much more time and effort than I had envisioned. I can see doing this process several times as I'm able to let more "go." 

Progress on the 
2022 Temperature
Quilt

✔5. Spend a day quilting with the granddaughters that live near me. It would be great to have the youngest get her quilt quilted and the oldest to make progress on her scrap blocks.

✔6. Begin catching up with the Rainbow Scrap Challenge blocks as I haven't stitched the blocks for April, May and June! I'm caught up! 

Six goals listed for July and I met all six. Hooray! Gertie, my inner squirrel has done a number of happy dances!

Books I listened too were:

The Deeds of the Disturber/Elizabeth Peters 3.5/5 and The Year of Magical Thinking/Joan Didion 3/5

I helped 29 people earn their American Heart CPR certification.

My August goals are:

1. Write one post about past book club book/quilt. I've two posts left to document the finished quilts I've made that were inspired by books I read through the Thread Tales book club. The book will likely be: The Soldier's Wife by Margaret LeRoy. 

2. Finish the 2022 Bonnie Hunter Mystery quilt. The pattern this year was Rhododendron Trail. I have the sleeve and label to attach.

3. Gertie, my inner squirrel, took me on a detour. She's seen so many fabrics/trims/patterns and started projects since I've begun the reorganization process in my studio. She's wanted to start or restart many projects; but, I managed to hold firm until she pulled the black squares that have been hanging about my "precuts" for a long time. She had a good idea. I added some red squares that were in my precuts too! This project is the guild challenge so I'll be doing some secret sewing. 

4. Fully finish the cross stitch projects I began in London.

5. Make at least swimsuit. I could use one in the backup pile. My granddaughters each picked fabric for a suit. Three is a lot to stitch; but, if I got into a groove. . .well, that is what I'm hearing from Gertie!

The current book club book

6. Make a plan of tackling the started projects and gifts that I stored into a couple tubs. It would be great to reduce the number of "opportunities" in those tubs! This is going to be my "cleaning/organizing" goal for this month.

7. Begin quilting the Lone Star Quilt. I need the pins so that we can baste my 8 year old granddaughter's quilt. This is going to be my One Monthly Goal. Check out what other people have planned to accomplish this month at Patty's link up: Elm Street Quilts One Monthly Goal August Link-up

8. Stay current with the Rainbow Scrap Challenge and the Temperature quilt blocks. The RSC color for August is orange. I plan to piece August into the temperature quilt along with March. This means that I'll be stitching two blocks a day. . .doable if I keep at it!

9. Determine a plan for the next book club quilt. We are reading: "Color: A Natural History of the Palette" by Victoria Finlay.

10. Add the binding to a quilt that I'm planning to gift to a graduate.

I hope to keep Gertie busy with #3 and #9 so she doesn't overwhelm me when I'm working on #6!