May is whizzing by and I haven’t even worked out how I’m doing with my Nineteen for 19 challenge for April, so here goes…

• 1 Scrap Quilt I was planning to start a new BOM with scraps, I’ve even sorted my scrap boxes out in preparation!! Then for once I got my sensible head on and decided I had quite enough projects on the go!
• 2 Tutorials; I’ve not had time to start this one yet.
• 3 sessions in the garden; The garden is coming on nicely, I built an arbour over Easter and after a visit to the Harrogate Flower Show I had lots of plants to sort out (still got a handful to plant!) I’ve been doing at least three sessions a week as the weeds are coming up as fast as the plants.

• 4 workshops; I’ve got three booked at Fabbadashery in Halifax, the first one is in about 4 weeks time, I’m looking forward to it. I’ll be stitch a Harold the Hare!
• 5 presents; I made a quilt for a friends charity, so I’m counting that as a gift, so it’ll be three so far this year.
• 6 quilts; I finished the Tula Pink quilt last month, it’s getting auctioned on Saturday, so fingers crossed it does OK. That brings my total up to two with lots on the go!

• 7 new patterns; I’m just in the process of cutting out a new pattern, but at the moment I’ve still just used 1 new pattern.
• 8 kits; My tally remains at two.
• 9 mini embroideries; I stitched a seascape this month for the travelling sketchbooks, so I’ve now done three mini embroideries.

• 10 things; I’ve not made any ‘things’ this month so my total so far is still three.

• 11 cross-stitch smalls; I’ve slowed down a bit this month as production was getting a bit mad! I have actually finished stitching one but I haven’t made it up yet, so it doesn’t count! I’ve got two other cross-stitches on the go so I’m trying to prioritise those, keeping my smalls for when I’m out and about. My total is nine so far anyway, so I can afford to slack off a bit!
• 12 pages in my book;I’m trying to clear the decks a bit before I start on this one as it’s going to be a pretty sentimental piece. It’s going to have all the pieces of my mums craftwork I found when clearing her house.
  13 clothes made; Still just 1! I got a bit of a wake-up call at the weekend when I struggled to find anything smart enough to wear for a funeral, if it had been winter I would have been OK, but spring is more difficult. It was a Hindu ceremony so it didn’t even need to be black. I need to spend a bit more time on clothes and less on quilting! I’ve just cut out some cullottes…
• 14 drawers organised;I’ve had a big sort out of my scraps and a general move round of stuff. I emptied my three IKEA cubes which were jam packed with scraps onto the floor on the landing and sorted them into colours, also removing bits that were just too small. My OH came up just at the wrong moment as I’d emptied one box out, he looked a bit shocked when I said there was another two…I now have six boxes of scraps!! …but they are colour sorted plus one just for batiks, so I think it will be much easier to use them. In order to spread out my scraps I’ve moved my linings into a peacock box and quilt waddings into a big knitting bag I made a couple of years ago.So altogether that’s five boxes sorted, so that takes my total to a respectable 8.

• 
  15 minutes tidy-up at the end of a sewing session; I’m getting better at this and it does make a difference!
  16 books; Now I’ve found slots in my daily routine for reading I’m really enjoying it again. I do most of my reading on the bus or the train. It takes an hour to get to visit my mum on the bus, it’s only 6 miles but the bus goes all round the houses, the advantage being it’s door to door…and it gives me useful reading time! I’ve discovered a new genre of books, books about walking, but they are more about the feelings walking up mountains can instill and the nature around, rather than a route book. They are what I would call slow reading books, I’m a bit of a one for skimming pages of a book, with these you can’t, they are beautifully written and deserve to be read properly! The first book is by Simon Ingram, called Between the Sunset and the Sea, I’ve not quite finished that one as it’s my bedtime reading book (the writing is too small to read on a bus!!) I have read The Old Ways by Robert McFarlane and Common Ground by Rob Cowan, I’ll do a proper write up when I’ve finished the Simon Ingram book. I’ve got quite a stack of books I’ve read now, eight so far this year.

• 17 blogs a month;I wrote 20 posts in April.
• 18 walks; We’ve done pretty well with our walks, which is lucky as it’s not long to our big walk in June. We walked up Pen-y-ghent which was a practise for next weekend when 40 of us from work are climbing the Three Peaks (well I’m just doing one!) We also started the Lady Anne Way and walked two sections from Skipton to Grassington. So with all that energy I’ve managed to double my tally to six walks.

• 19 Splendid Sampler blocks;I’m trying to crack on with this one (part of my clearing the decks!!) so last month I managed five new blocks, so 14 so far this year, but 30 altogether!

So, with a third of the year gone I’ve done a fair bit, some challenges haven’t got off the ground yet and others are racing to the finish!