Sewing with Certainty: Goals!

Jessica over at Quilty Habit has recently launched a new series called Sewing with Certainty.  Her goals for participants are to provide 1) encouragement and experimentation with your sewing and quilting; and 2) inject even more positivity into the wonderful world of sewing.  Sounds like a pretty good deal to me!

Our assignment for this first link-up is to "Write a blog post about the crafty areas in which you want to gain more confidence, and/or discuss a project you will be working on during the series that will help you gain this confidence."  I have two goals, kind of related to each other.

Goal #1: Actually complete a BOM quilt.
I have  several BOMs pinned on my Pinterest "Quilts" board, but have yet to actually do any of them.  I think my hesitation is because while I've got several finished quilts under my belt, I have little experience in just making blocks.  My HST skills are minimal and I've never made a flying goose (is that the right singular for flying geese blocks??).  I worry that my seam allowances won't be spot on and I'll end up with half my blocks measuring 1/2" to small and the other half measuring 1/2" too big, and then I'll just get ticked off (at myself) and quit.  But hey, the only way to get better is to try, right?  And goodness knows, practice certainly makes perfect.  I'd also like to one day feel confident enough in these basic skills to participate in a bee of some kind - they seem like a such fun!
  

Virtual Quilting Bee

Sisters' Ten BOM

Goal #2: Try paper piecing
It seems like several of the BOMs I've pinned have at least one paper-pieced block, so I guess I should have made this my first goal instead of the second.  Paper piecing is a skill I feel like I need to learn in order to advance in this quilty world, plus the blocks people make are so cool!  For example, Faith at Fresh Lemons Quilts is hosting a Lighthouse Quilt Along that looks pretty straightforward but the final result is so clean and graphic.  I also found this cute paper pieced goldfish template forever ago that I would love to turn into an actual quilt.

Lighthouse Quilt Along

Goal #3: Free motion quilting

I know I said two goals, but really, if I'm being honest this is one I really need to work on.  I can quilt in straight lines with relatively few problems, but I have never tried to FMQ.  Part of my concern is that the throat of my machine seems pretty small (to me at least).  I don't know that I'd really be able to do much maneuvering of a quilt to make the designs - I have to roll quilts up pretty tightly just to do straight-line quilting.  But, I could probably do small things like potholders or pieces for bags, which would be good practice for when I am able to get a machine with a larger throat.

Great sewing machine, small space for quilting.

Three goals seems like a good start to me!  Guess I need to go start thinking about that BOM quilt - thanks for the inspiration, Jessica!