No Shame Train

 The No Shame Train is a sub-group of the PebbleCreek Quilters whose purpose is to get UFOs finished. The group is facilitated by two energetic teachers who are good motivators and presenters. They've run the No Shame Train in past years so they have "lesson plans" for each meeting. The No Shame Train is very popular; so many people signed up that we don't all fit in the Fiber Arts room, so we're meeting in one of PC's ballrooms. 

The first meeting was in December and the homework assignment was: 

- Write down how you define UFO

- Gather all your UFOs in one place and photograph them. 

- List them all or create a spreadsheet.

The second meeting was yesterday. We broke down into small groups and discussed our definitions of a UFO, and why projects end up in UFO status. We also shared ideas how we can help each other move forward. 

The No Shame Train leaders use the term UFO very inclusively, encompassing any WIP, kit, unstarted project for which fabric and a pattern have been pulled, and any other hobby such as scrapbooking, knitting, or whatever generates UFOs. It doesn't matter if it's a current project or many years old. 

In our small group there were as many definitions of UFO as participants. Such was the case in all the other groups as well. It doesn't matter, all are welcome and it only matters how you define UFO for yourself.

For myself, I define UFO and WIP separately. WIP is any project started within the last 12 months, or any ongoing project that can only be worked on periodically such as a BOM or my WIGSP. A UFO, to me, is any started project that's more than 12 months old. I don't buy kits and I don't count fabric pulled for a potential project that hasn't been cut. 

Because I moved last year I purged a lot of UFOs and WIPs before the move. I donated finished tops to someone who could quilt and finish them for a charity. I abandoned and discarded or gave away other projects that I was never going to get to. I had a couple of my mother-in-law's UFOs that I once had good intentions of finishing but never did, so I gave them to my sister-in-law and she will have someone from her church finish them. 

So that left me with the following projects, some of which I had completely forgotten about: 

 1. Winding Ways, hand pieced bee blocks, probably from about 2015 or 2016. I think there's one block missing and I don't have any more of these fabrics.

2. Sample for Kristen's quilt, 2014. My niece thought she'd like to make a quilt when she was about 12 so I created a simple pattern for her. I cut pieces to sew along with her so I could send her tutorials for each step. She never did start her quilt. She's in college now. 

3. Mineral Plus flimsy. Was going to be a Hands2Help donation a few years ago but it's kind of big for me to easily baste and quilt. Then life interrupted. 

4. Bright Strippy Race flimsy. Was an experimental strip pieced project from 2019(?) that I thought might become a patio quilt for my someday Arizona home. Or a donation quilt. 

5. Tessellated top, marked for quilting, with backing fabric. Pre-2008. At the time I lacked the skill to machine quilt it the way I wanted it to look, and I didn't want to hand quilt it. At 52" square it's an awkward size for an adult and the colors are not suitable for a baby. 

6. Star Spangled Spiral. Technically not a UFO to me, this unquilted top was a remake last summer for a pattern and teaching sample. My plan is to leave it unquilted for a teaching sample, then someday if I'm no longer teaching I'll quilt it and donate it as a QOV. 

7. Scrappy Nine Patch Stars flimsy. Made several years ago, also a teaching sample deliberately left unquilted. 

8. Kid quilt from squares given to me by Wanda in 2019. Kitted as an extra project to take to retreat in case I needed another project to work on. 

9. Also less than 1 year old, Batik Race. Since I cut way too many batik strips for my patio pillows and put the strips together race-style, this is left over made-yardage. There's enough here to make a large throw quilt, but I have no plans for it.

10. Self Round Robin. Started as a personal challenge to use a set of curved templates. Life intervened.

11. Leftover blocks, 2014. All Kaffe fabrics, from when I was making quilts for my book Cut and Shuffle Quilts, but I revised the pattern after starting them. I already have a Cut and Shuffle quilt in these fabrics. 

So this month's homework is to: 

1. Create a priority plan

2. Start

3. Set a goal for next meeting in February

4. Bring any completed projects for show and tell. 

YIKES!!!
I already have a lengthy list of goals for January and I'm teaching a Cut and Shuffle Quilts class later this month which is my big priority. I haven't taught it since before Covid so I have some prep to do. Plus, my book is now sold out and some of the class attendees didn't get one, so for them I'm creating a stand-alone pattern of one of the quilts in the book. Something is probably not going to get done this month, and this No Shame Train stuff is lower priority than my other stuff. I guess that's how come these projects are all UFOs. Wish me luck! 

PS - Could there be any more acronyms?!!! :-)