My 2024 "Create Daily" tracker has a new format!

My creative, online friend, Sarah Reebs @smrt783, has created a new calendar/tracker format for 2024. She uses it for her embroidery practice and I've adopted it for my Create Daily tracker.

Create Daily tracker for 2024

It's refreshingly different, don't you think? It's exciting to have a new format for this new year.

Trackers through the years

I've used two other tracker formats in the past. They're all fascinating and clever and I love to fill in the little box for each day! I started using a tracker in 2020, calling it my Stitching Success Tracker. After two years, and a broader scope in my creative practice, it morphed into the Create Daily Tracker.

Here are the Create Daily Trackers from 2022 and 2023. This is another design by Sarah.

Create Daily 2023 tracker

Create Daily 2022 tracker

Here are the Stitching Success Trackers from 2020 and 2021. This design was created by Karalenn Hippen.

Stitching Success tracker 2021

Stitching Success tracker 2020

This is the fifth year documenting a daily art, textile and stitching practice using a creative tracker. Let's see what 2024 brings!

Trackers, planners, checklists and games

I make lists. Do you?
Actually, I need to make lists because the barrage of demands that vies for my attention at any one time can cause me to forget what I'm supposed to do. 

I also like trackers and calendars. And apparently, several of you like them too since I've been asked where I found some of mine. 

My assortment of stitching strackers, planners, checklists and games.

I use trackers to keep up with and document the progress on long-term and short-term quilting and sewing projects and daily practices. I find it interesting to reflect on past years' accomplishments and compare them with current plans... and I also enjoy "ticking off the boxes." 

Trackers and planners: paper or digital?

Many of my trackers are paper trackers that are printed from digital files. Online sew-alongs and Challenges often offer downloadable PDF trackers to keep participants organized. I print these out and then paste them into a sketchbook. 

• Make Nine
• 100 Days 100 Blocks
• Stitching Success Tracker 
• Create Daily success tracker
• my quilt guild made up a Quilting Success Bingo card

With these, I get to physically "color in" or "cross off" the completed activities—usually with a variety of colored pencils.

Some of my trackers are digital: 

• photos and IG postings for the 100 Day Project
• photos and IG postings for the 100 Days 100 Blocks Challenge
• an Excel spreadsheet for my blog postings

This is my new Create Daily success tracker for 2022.

Create Daily success tracker for 2022.

This tracker was for the 100 Days 100 Blocks project in 2021.

The 100 Days 100 Blocks tracker/checklist for making, photographing and posting photos.

Staying encouraged

Every checkmark or colored square gives me a sense of accomplishment. I'm always thrilled and  pleased by how much can be completed when working on something every day—even if only for a few minutes. Having a visual reminder of things I've finished and prompts for new things keeps me  motivated, mindful and on track. 

All boxes covered on my guild's Quilting Success Bingo card. BINGO!

And who doesn't like coloring in or crossing off the little boxes??? Then one day you shout... BINGO!

A new "Create Daily" tracker for 2022

Formerly called my Stitching Success Tracker, this year I have a new "Create Daily" tracker. 

Create Daily 2022 success tracker.

This cool 2022 round calendar chart is the creation of Sarah Reebs from Keep Right Except to Pass (New for 2022 post) and on Instagram at smrt783. We crossed paths on IG having both used the Nerd Bucket calendar last year. 

Sarah created this new calendar for a project in 2022 and licensed it under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. I had to add the dates/numbers in the boxes so I could more easily keep up with the day of the month.

It's a very eye-catching calendar, don't you think? She did a fabulous job.

Creating a daily practice

I achieved 365 days of stitching success in 2021. So this year I'm incorporating other creative activities into a daily creative practice. Along with stitching activities—patchwork, free-motion quilting, sewing, knitting, slow stitching, etc.—I'm including art and mixed media techniques—drawing, stamp carving, painting, collage, etc. This is why I've changed the name from Stitching Success Tracker to the Create Daily success tracker. 

The color-coded legend indicates the different colors for activities and finishes. I'm hoping the inclusion of art processes in a daily practice will help me improve these skills. 

For all the activities I will be using my hands to create. I like that.

2021 Stitching Success Tracker and My Year in Review

2021 has come to an end and my Stitching Success Tracker was 100% colored in—meaning I did some kind of stitching, patchwork, quilting or related fiber art each and every day in 2021. Some days could be as little as a few embroidery stitches on a sampler or basting one 3/4" hexagon to the free-motion quilting marathon for this year's guild Challenge entry. 

December 31, 2021: Stitching Success Tracker.

I'm feeling good about the projects that were completed this year—some new, some unexpected and a few that were languishing in the UFO pile for quite some time (4 decades for one of them). The photo montages below tell about my year in fabrics and stitching.

Online Challenges keep me motivated

Motivation throughout the year was provided by several online Challenges I participated in. The 100 Day Project (I did two different practices), September Textile Love, 100 Days 100 Blocks, the Dropcloth Picnic Sampler stitch-along, Make Nine 2021 and a Quilting Success Bingo game issued by my local quilt guild.

Online Challenges: The 100 Day Project, Picnic Sampler stitch along, 100 Days 100 Blocks,
September Textile Love and Quilting Bingo

One of the successes from the September Textile Love Challenge was documenting a garment I'd made in 2015. The prompt was "repurpose" and my Tablecloth Jacket was the epitome of upcycling and repurposing. I'm glad to have this special garment documented.

Useful items for family, friends and community

The practical side of me likes to make things that someone not only appreciates, but uses. I made several sets of pillowcases for family and friends, charity quilts and kitty quilts for our pack of tuxedo kitties.

Pillow cases and charity quilts.

Shop samples serve as inspiration to others

For my job as a fabric strategist and sales representative, I support my clients by providing ideas, projects and patterns that can be made with the fabrics I rep. Surprisingly, I made six quilts showcasing one of my favorite fabric lines, M&S Textiles Australia. 

Quilts and projects made with fabrics from M&S Textiles Australia.

I collaborated with a few longarm quilters to get some of these finishind and they are traveling around to quilt shops and independent sewing centers helping to inspire quilters, sewers and makers.

My Guild Challenge entry

A two-year project that I'm quite proud of is my entry for the 2020-21 Choo Choo Quilters Guild Challenge. The turn-out for the Challenge was exceptional and my quilt, "Alone Together," got the first place ribbon. One of the principles of a guild Challenge is to push oneself and try new things. I did and was very pleased with the results. My experiments and discoveries are documented here.

"Alone Together"
My entry in the 2020-21 Choo Choo Quilters Guild Challenge.

I was also on the hosting committee for the Challenge and made the four award ribbons for the winning entries.

Guild Challenge ribbons.

Guild Challenge ribbons (backs).

Garments

It must have been the year for my Australia fabrics because two of my makes—my Kangaroo Nine Lives top and my new Berwick St. tunic—were made from this fabric line (top photos).

Garment highlights from 2021.

The bottom two garments were both made during a Shakerag workshop. The Porcupine shirt was shibori dyed this year (a Make Nine project) and the Tablecloth Jacket was made in 2015 (a response to one of the prompts of the September Textile Love challenge this year).

A UFO quilt was finished!

My final Make Nine finish for the year was a UFO [unfinishing object] string quilt than spanned two centuries. It was happily gifted for Christmas.

"All Together Now" completed December 2021.

Small projects are big successes

Small projects are very satisfying to me. The time investment can be less or more than a bigger project. You never know. Three of these were made in response to the Make Nine challenge, the zipper pouch was a gift for a friend who retired, and the exposed spine artist book was from a workshop I took this year with Doug Baulos. The fabric twine was a new technique I learned and it was rewarding to find a use for skinny fabric scraps and trimmings.

Top row: needle book, fabric twine, crochet cat bed.
Bottom row: boro and rag drawstring bag, artist book, zipper pouch.

All and all, I think 2021 was a productive and well-documented year.

Good night, and Happy New Year.

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For those that asked about the Stitching Success Tracker and where to get this cool, creative project management tool, here is my original blog post and where I found this calendar.

Thoughts about binding a quilt with Big Stitch

It's been a loooong time since I've hand quilted a quilt. With quilters, stitchers and makers retreating to the solace of handwork in 2020, I was inspired to add Big Stitch quilting to complement the Australian Aboriginal fabric designs in this piece. The colorful dots and dashes of perle cotton running stitches make a lovely, tactile addition to the organic Dreamtime designs. 

Hand stitched binding using Big Stitch with 5 wt. perle cotton threads.

In an earlier blog post, I highlighted the Big Stitch hand quilting on this quilt. This past week, the binding was attached and hand stitched down.  

The quilted sandwich was trimmed and binding pinned. It's ready for hand stitching.

Binding a quilt with decorative stitches

I frequently use decorative machine stitches to bind charity quilts and kitty quilts. This is when the binding is attached to the back of the quilt, brought around the edge to the front, and machine stitched down. It's fast and efficient. But this was my first "go" at using visible hand stitching as both a decorative and functional element for the binding.

Binding sewn down with Big Stitch running stitches in 5 wt. perle cotton.

Threads and Fabrics

I used perle cotton threads for the hand quilting and the hand binding stitches—8 wt. and 5 wt., mostly Eleganza from WonderFil Specialty Threads. 

Front and back of the quilt with hand quilting and hand stitched binding.

The fabrics used in this quilt are all Australian Aboriginal designs from M&S Textiles Australia.

• Sandy Creek red in the center and cornerstones,
• Sandhill red for the outside borders,
• Kangaroo Path yellow for the inner border,
• Women Collecting Water yellow for the backing and binding.

The pattern for this quilt is called Blue Girl by Villa Rosa Designs.

Sandy Creek quilt. Finished size: 50.5" x 51"

Thoughts about Big Stitching the binding

I really enjoyed the Big Stitch quilting... choosing the thread colors, following the lines in the fabric prints with running stitches, seeing the quilt come to life with the hand stitching. To be honest, although I really like the end result of the Big Stitch binding, it was more difficult and time consuming than I had expected.

Big Stitch hand quilting and Big Stitch quilt binding.

Cons:

• I found I could do only one stitch at a time on the binding. For the quilting, I could load the needle with multiple stitches before drawing the needle through the quilt sandwich. And although the hand stitching is a slower process, this one-stitch-at-a-time binding process was unenjoyably slow.
• Even though I went through the binding and only the top layer of fabric and the batting, the needle was difficult to pull through with every stitch. The effort and struggle took the fun out of the hand stitching. Maybe a 12 wt. cotton thread would alleviate this??
• I also wonder if a blanket stitch would be easier.

Pros:

• It was rather easy to keep the stitches at a consistent place on the binding. As one thread ran out, I chose a new color and continued. Just like with the hand quilting.
• It was fun to add the "Xs" at the mitered corners.
• The drape of a hand quilted quilt is quite lovely.
• The free-motion machine quilting (with blending colors of thread) and the larger, more colorful running stitches are very sympatico on this quilt. Both techniques created a cohesive and beautiful texture on the quilt and the Big Stitch on the binding carried the concept through to the finishing... and the edge of the quilt.

Sandy Creek quilt with hand and machine quilting.

Further investigation required

If anyone reading has insights or suggestions for hand binding with Big Stitch, I would welcome your thoughts! Were I to try it again in the future, I might experiment with different/lighter thread weights or another stitch design (blanket stitch?). 

This was a good learning experience for a "first try" and I'm quite pleased with the end result (just not so much with the process). The Stitching Success Tracker is counting it as a "finish."

August Stitching Success Tracker.

Stitching Success Tracker: the halfway mark

It's July... and the first half of 2021 is in the past. A look at the Stitching Success Tracker indicates a lot of hand stitching, patchwork, English paper piecing and spurts of garment making happened from January through June. So, I'm pleased with my stitching accomplishments for these first six months of this year!

Stitching Success Tracker from January - June, 2021.

Completed Make Nine projects

Moving from an activity-based report to a project-based report, my Make Nine 2021 is also fairing well with 6 successfully completed projects.

• January: Crumb quilt
• March: Easy and Fun pillow cases and cuddle quilt charity project
• April: New-to-me Berwick Street Tunic
• June: Upcycled indigo dyed shirt and needle book
  
  

Make Nine 2021 progress through June.

The first half of 2021 has been filled with fabric, thread, stitching and textile creativity.

Just how I like it.

At 90% of The 100 Day Project

It felt a bit "draggy" around the 70-80% mark... and I was pushing myself to stick with it... but now, at over 90%, I can't believe it's nearing the 100 Day finish line.

221 three-quarter inch hexies at day 90 of the 100 Day Project 2021.

At the 90% mark, this is 221 three-quarter inch hexagons for one of my 100 Day Projects. 

Past mileposts are: at 75%.

Day 75 of the 100 Day Project 2021.

At 50%

Day 50 of the 100 Day Project 2021.

At 33%

Day 33 of the 100 Day Project 2021.

After the first week.

The first week of the 100 Day Project 2021.

And, the 2021 Stitching Success Tracker has moved into the month of May.

Starting May 2021 of the Stitching Success Tracker calendar.

The background fabric is a canvas panel called "September Morning" from Northcott Fabrics. I'm contemplating a slow stitching zipper bag or possibly a combo of hand and machine stitching. Mood and inspiration will dictate.

Happy Easter Bunnies with EPP

Happy Easter. Happy Spring. 

Three-quarter inch EPP hexies from the 100 Day Project.

These English paper pieced [EPP] bunny hexagons are for Day 64 of my 100 Day Project. 

And my 2021 Stitching Success Tracker is looking colorful for the first quarter of the year. 

Off to a great start! The first quarter 2021 of the Stitching Success Tracker.

The weather is getting more Spring-like and the days are growing longer. I'll be enjoying stitching handwork as well as a little more sunshine today.

Stitch Success Tracker on target for March 2021

January and February 2021 are a wrap and the 2021 Stitching Success Tracker is fully colored with stitching activities for both months. March is starting with a good track record.

January and February on my 2021 Stitching Success Tracker.

I'm enjoying and being challenged with both of my 100 Day Projects—EPP 3/4" hexagons and Slow Drawing studies. And I've completed one of my 2021 Make Nine projects. 

2021 Stitching Success Tracker calendar.

One of the popular EPP hexie posts was this one... which makes me contemplate potential patchwork or applique compositions once the 100 days are up.

From my #100daysofepphexies

A new Stitching Success Tracker for 2021

In January 2020, I found this cool "graphic" calendar from Nerd Bucket.blogspot. I call it my "Stitching Success Tracker" and adopted it to track my quilting and creative stitching activities through the year. Any day I got to work on a project/activity—patchwork, hand stitching, sewing, knitting, quilting, etc.—I'd color in the corresponding "day" on the calendar. 

2020 Stitching Success Tracker.

A Color Legend for daily tracking
Not realizing what 2020 would bring [a global pandemic] or the range of activities I got into [prompted by shelter-in-place], the idea was to use colors for different activities and a "contrast color" for a finished project. So in 2020, the "blue" days indicate a project finish—many corresponding to my Make Nine list. The "gray" days indicate I didn't have an opportunity for creative activities [looks like 28 of them].   :-( 

Turning the page to 2021, I'm starting with a fresh new calendar! With hindsight into last year's experience, I also pre-planned the color-coded legend. 

• 9 activity categories—blues, greens, purples.
• 1 "other" category for a new activity that may arise. 
• 3 contrasting colors—red, orange and yellow—for different finishes. 

2021 Stitching Success Tracker, with color-coded legend.

Three days into the new year, I've made time for patchwork. I also have handwork projects that can easily travel with me. 

I hope not to miss a day of stitching or creative activities this year.

Stitching every day

Even when you stitch most every day... there is still not enough time to get it all done.

December 11 status of the Stitching Success Tracker.

Here's what the 2020 Stitching Success Tracker looked like at the beginning of January.

Early January when I started using the Stitching Success Tracker.

Stitching Success Tracker: December status

December. The last month of the year... and a status update of my 2020 Stitching Success Tracker.

2020 Stitching Success Tracker: December status.

November hexagons
On the EPP [English paper piecing] front, 15 hexagon blocks were (surprisingly) completed in November. Four had a patriotic theme for the 2020 election and one commemorating Thanksgiving. 

I picked up several fat quarters on my travels and am still enjoying "selective cutting" motifs for various shaped pieces. This project is one that was resurrected during the quarantine shut-down—when many of us makers were seeking something soothing, creative and distracting from world events happening around us.

15 hexagons finished in November.

Ten hexies were finished in October.

10 hexagons finished in October.

Make Nine 2020
My Improv Garter Stitch Wrap was finished in November—a project I'm still thrilled about and wear most every day. This project was Finish #8 of 9.

Make Nine 2020 status.

I've started on the ninth item on my Make Nine list—a jacket using a kalamkari fabric from Diamond Textiles.

Pattern piece layout for a kalamkari jacket.

I love this piece of fabric! The colors and design are classic. It's hand block printed with natural dyes and it reflects the culture of this technique and the long, rich history of textiles. After taking a kalamkari workshop offered by Selvedge magazine, I have a new appreciation and admiration for this printing process.