Four Steps To A Successful Sewing Year!

A new year and here are four steps to a successful sewing year!

I love “fresh starts”, “new beginnings”, and all the excitement that surrounds them. My “fresh starts” throughout the year are January 1^st, May 1^st, and September 1^st. During these “fresh starts” I like to look at what’s working and what’s not working, what new things do I want to try, what habits do I want to create, etc. This works for my quilting business along with my personal life.

Funny thing I have learned is that we don’t have to wait for these BIG dates. Sometimes I like to consider every Monday to be a new beginning as well!

Some of the things I consider are: house cleaning habits, I don’t enjoy cleaning, but it needs be done. Cooking dinner, menus, meal prep, cook once eat twice, and the list goes on and on. I like to cook, but mostly I love to eat homecooked meals. The crockpot is my friend. I make at least one meal a week with this and sometimes more. I have a segment in my newsletter called, “We All Have To Eat” where I share recipes and tips occasionally.

I’m always working on keeping my sewing room clean and organized now. I give myself a C-. Honestly, I’d rather just be sewing. Sometimes just finding time to sew is hard. My motto, “Always Find Time To Sew” is more for myself and sometimes it’s hard. Then we have working on our “works in progress”, UFO’s, and new projects. I want to start the new projects before I finish the old ones! I know you understand.

First in my quilting/sewing business I want to have a better understanding of where I’m heading, what I want to talk about in these blogs and newsletters. What projects I want to complete and what products do I want to sell. I will be working one quarter at a time. This works for my personal tasks as well. Don’t try to plan out the whole year. That gets too overwhelming. Plan quarterly.

I’ve got a large list of UFO’s (unfinished objects) and I truly want to find a way to tackle some of these.

I’ll be starting small. Usually, I want to bite off a big bite that is way too much for me to handle. Implementing or creating small changes at a time will lead to better success! I hope to create a simple morning routine and once I have a handle on that, I will create a simple afternoon routine. They will definitely include sewing time!

Being consistent in everything is important too. Social media is hard for me to be consistent. Cleaning my house is hard for me to be consistent every week. Again, starting small should help me tackle this and be more consistent.

Looking back helps you to move forward. I will be looking back on this past year to evaluate what is working and what isn’t. I want to look back every month and evaluate the previous month. Sometimes it’s clear early on that something isn’t working and something new needs to be tried. Finally, I want to try and see how my week is going…every week. Yikes! I might be biting off more than I can chew. I’ll be starting this slowly and trying to be consistent.

I like that I can use these four powerful tools that work not only for business, but personal goals as well!

Remember: Plan Quarterly, Start Small, Be Consistent, and Looking Back Helps You Move Forward.

Quilting Friends of Jerianns Handmade

We all love to sew and quilt, but we all have many of the same things in our personal lives that we need to do. Having a community behind us can really help. Sharing with each other is so helpful in this journey. That is one reason I started the private Facebook Group, Quilting Friends of Jerianns Handmade. I want this to be a sharing community of our quilting/sewing journey. If you haven’t joined yet, we would love to have you! One of my goals is to be more consistent there and try to get some helpful conversations going.

Share with us your goals and tips in the Facebook Group so we can help you or be helped by you. It takes a village!

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Always find time to sew,