I try to take a lot of pictures when we go somewhere, and even around town because where we live isn’t a place that a lot of people can visit. And sometimes I fail at that because I think okay, I’ve seen that fountain every day this week, or I’ve seen the sunset over the buildings every night. But in trying to be better at reminding myself to take pictures, I decided to start sharing color palettes. I made a few and it’s kind of surprising how much blue and green exist here. 🙂 First up, is a picture taken on our camping trip last summer.

And for the quilters, crafters, and sewist’s out there – matching Kona colors!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For your own palettes, you definitely need to use the Palette Builder at PlayCrafts.

My word for the year is EMBRACE.

I looked back on my quilty bucket list and sadly, I haven’t made much progress! I have a few more hexagons made for one quilt, but just fabric picked out for others. I’ve barely moved forward here. I am taking stock of what I have and what I can do to move forward. I don’t want things on a list, just waiting to be done. I’m not like that, I like to make lists and cross things off! Maybe it was also the idea of the bucket list – a far off “someday” kind of feeling.

I also took a look at my finish along for the last quarter of 2014 and realized I have not finished anything! I only had four things on the list, and I made progress on everything but no finishes. I started working on the star quilt first and I have six diamonds finished now. I also have the baby quilts basted but not quilted. And the advent calendar, I have more pieces sewn and I started quilting the main panel, but it’s not totally done yet. I am definitely EMBRACING finishing things. No more stacks of finished tops or things waiting for one more thing to be done.

Everything is tied together of course – the year of making and the EMBRACE of things and ideas. My love of making lists and crossing things off ties together well with finishing my projects. I participate in swaps and send gifts to my family. Make sure you buy the your best year workbook! Use the tools that work for you to plan your best year, full of lists you can cross things off of, and projects you will make and share with everyone.

Oh and how about some crafty resolutions! I love every single one of these. I wrote them in my bullet journal as a reminder to myself, and sure some of them I always think of, but having it written down is also nice.

It’s Christmas Eve! If you celebrate Christmas, I hope tonight is amazing for you.

Sometimes I really miss going to church back home in South Dakota, walking up the hill, and racing my cousins along the way. We don’t attend church regularly, hardly ever actually, but I do miss it during the holidays.

Tonight for us is full of good food, matching pajamas, and watching a movie or two. The kids will have a hard time sleeping I’m sure, but for the past couple (or even longer actually!) of years they have all slept in! No waking up at 5AM for them. I’ll have a breakfast casserole ready to stick in the oven so we have a good breakfast to start the day.

I am crazy excited for the new year. I have so much planned for the podcast, for my quilt pattern business, and our family has a lot going on too. I look forward to continuing to eat delicious food here, family and friends visiting, my language skills improving, and so much more. I’d love to hear what you have planned!

I encourage you to take a few minutes and read the Sewing for Sydney FAQ to see how you can be involved in this generous project Molli Sparkles set up. The anxiety I feel when this happens, when the news reports on a terrorist act, on children being murders, on hostages. I pray that those affected find peace. And I will sew, because any comfort I feel may be transferred to the families that receive a quilt.

There are a few ways you can get involved – donating money (Josh is very open and offered to share his transaction history on paypal to anyone donating if they need that) for the purchase of batting and quilt materials, shipping and handling, and more. This is important because it will all cost – but I think the main thing to donate is the quilt blocks. He created a hashtag quilt block tutorial and requested blocks be sent to him by January 2, 2015. You can also send blocks to Julie at The Intrepid Thread in CA, that will help with the cost of postage.

I have a few blocks cut up and will be sending them soon. I hope you’ll do the same!