12.3 SQ Episode 022 – The 15 Minute Episode

Podcast Feed

We are working on our focusing skills in this podcast.

A good goal to get yourself motivated to work on a project is to tell yourself you are only going to work on the project for 15 minutes.

Once you get started, you can either extend or stop your time on your project, but this gets you started, and gives you an escape to get into and out of your sewing room.

How to help structure your 15 minute “power session”

1.  Prepare

• Set rulesguidelines to how you want to handle your special time. (use your left brain here so it’s not left out later)
  • How long do you want to focus
  • How will you handle interruptions
  • DON’T RUSH just because you’re timed
  • How many days a week do you want to do this?  Daily? weekly?  Do you want to carryover into the next day?
• Clean your space
  • Spending a small amount of time before working on your project to clean up will free up your brain for the fun stuff to come
  • It helps to find your projects before you start!
  • If you skip the cleaning, you may regret it because your brain can’t truly focus.
  • Just spend a little bit of time at this – don’t obsess!
• Set your intentions and tell others
  • Let people know you want to block out your time
  • Be up front and don’t back down on giving up your time
  • Keep your word so that people will respect when you say 15 minutes, they trust that you are done in 15 minutes – helps better next time
• Plan out your strategy for the work to come

2.  Focusing (working)

• Set a timer
  • You can find a timer:
    • on your microwave
    • on your oven
    • online
    • your cell phone
    • your ipod
    • a digital watch
• Stay on 1 project for the specific amount of time
  • During this 15 minutes, focus on one thing, don’t switch to a new project
  • After one session is over, you can switch in the next session
  • You can break up the hour with 3 different projects this way if you stop after each 15 minutes
• Take breaks in between sessions
  • Go check up on your kids, pets, significant others
  • Stretch and breathe and unfocus for a while
• Give yourself an escape if you don’t like a project
  • Stick with a project until you have done either 3 15 minute sessions
  • Or you have completed two separate items of the same technique
  • Give yourself a little bit of time to know if you like it
  • Give yourself time to learn a technique once, because the 2nd time around it may not be as hard as the first time

3.  Attitude

• Align your attitude with the current progress, rather than product finished
• Remove the negative voices that judge
  • how much progress you have made
  • how much you don’t think you are good at the technique
  • how you hate structure
• This is not a punishment technique, but a freeing opportunity to work on something you like to do
• Don’t be hard on yourself if you don’t get it done every day
• Have fun with your projects
• Give yourself a big hand for all you’ve done

**Edited 08-28-2011: You can see the 15 minute challenge & link up with Kate at Life In Pieces blog

We talked about the home sewing front, and regular blog readers will find this in the past blog posts.

We got into a discussion about work, snow, sunshine, the benefits of working on a complicated project in helping to boost your confidence, and my quilt guild, and my quilt guild’s current opportunity quilt to be drawn in July, and how I am looking forward to being an active part of the quilt show with my guild.

My guild’s shutterfly website is found here, and I have taken an active role in getting pictures taken and posted for the quilt guild – something small I can do to give back to the guild and pay it forward.

Lastly, I talked about the velocity results, how I learned a few things about a giveaway, and the results, which can be found in the previous post.

The list of blog commenters who haven’t been thanked publicly since December are:

Rachel, Debby NY. Glenna, Laura, Janet, Jackie Jackie’s Quilting Corner CV Quiltworks, LabMom, Jane, Linda P, knitwish, jenyjenny, Pam Hip to be Square, Anne Marie Unearthing Quiltabilty, Sandi Quilt Cabana Corner, Jane, Leah, Colleen, Jill, Nonnie, Barbara, Tami, Lisa, Gail, Ballardquilter

emailers (not thanked in the podcast, but still appreciated) since December

Pierce, Robyn, Brye Lynn Sew Stitch Create, Reeze, Sarah Stash Resolution, Lily, Michele, Celia, Kelley Pioneer Quilter, Allison Within a Quarter Inch, Kathi, Jane, Marguerita, Victoria

12.2 Velocity Results … Finally!

Thanks for all 5 of you that participated in

I learned a few things about myself when hosting this type of event, which I will share on the next podcast.

Here’s my bullet list of what I learned:

• get a great giveaway item
• show the item for the giveaway first to help with participation
• don’t make a giveaway so complicated!
• don’t make a giveaway a really long time frame
• giveaways that seem complicated just get put off until later … and later …
• give a hard and fast deadline to when the results will be given – no excuses
• set a timer to help you get past the fact that figuring out the results may seem hard (even though it’s not)
• once you get past the initial inertia of figuring out results, it is NEVER as hard as you think
• you forgot how much joy you have in creating the giveaway to begin with if you never work on it!
• dimensional analysis will get you through times when you haven’t done the math right

… You want actual results?

How fast do we sew?  Really?

Here’s a copy of the pdf of the google document that I created.

velocityexperiment-2

Here’s the picture (for those who don’t have pdf readers handy):

This is not meant to be a display on who can sew fastest when, so I blurred the names here, except mine.

The highlighted column ends up being the speed in yards / minute as I have calculated.  I hope I got all the kinks worked out on the yards / minute calculation.

(note: there are 3 feet in a yard, 12 inches in a foot, and 60 seconds in a minute, and forgetting one or all of these facts can cause you to go crazy for about a half hour)

Actual conclusions (to the data, not to how I mishandled the giveaway and experimental results).

• Two quilters sewed faster when sewing full length strips rather than sewing blocks.
• One quilter sewed faster when chain piecing blocks than sewing full length strips
• MY speed was the slowest of them all when it came to sewing blocks.  And right now I can’t remember if I actually sewed two pieces of 2 and a half width blocks instead of one piece.  If I sewed a length of 5 inches instead of 2.5 then my speed would be much closer to the speed of sewing everything else.
• Sometimes cats, ironing, threadies under the fabric get in the way and slow us down.
• The width of the strips DOES matter on speed.  The narrow 1.5 inch strips are slower on all quilters who attempted them, and the fastest speed is on 8.5 inch blocks.
• Some people get in a rush when trying to time themselves and cause themselves more trouble than they would otherwise.
• The average speed of all the results is 1.36 yards / minute.  We can sew just about 1 and 1 third yards of fabric in a minute’s time.  And do it accurately.
• Some people don’t like timing themselves, but everyone who did, I am truly grateful
• I have a timer on my iPod Nano that I didn’t know I had

Feel free to continue to participate and now that I have the database set up better, I can hopefully reply much faster (get it – faster?) with the velocity.

Giveaway

For the giveaway, I assigned each trial that people timed a separate # and then used the random number generator to determine the winner of the giveaway.

And the winner is:

Janet!

Sending you an e-mail Janet, hope to get in contact with you soon!

9.2 SQ Episode 019 – The Velocity of Quilting – Part 2

Podcast Feed

The velocity of quilting is how we think of quilting using velocity terms and concepts. The concepts are defined in Part 1 of this episode.

  

Direction

The direction you travel mentally and physically correspond to your quilting goals. Finding out what you want to accomplish.

Ask yourself the questions and you’ll find your quilting velocity direction:

1. What type of project do I want to do?
2. How much work am I willing to do towards the project? 
3. Do I know how to start the project or are there learning steps to handle before I get to that point?
4. How much do I still have to purchase in supplies to finish the project?
5. Am I creating the project for someone else?
6. What is the project intended for? Is it for a wallhanging, a treasured bed quilt, a new baby, a tired kiddo, a memory of someone long gone?

Or you could actually think about the physical directions to obtain your quilting supplies:

1. What direction to the nearest quilt shop?
2. How many quilt shops can I steer away from on my long trip to somewhere else?
3. What part of the store do you like the most, the back where all the quilt samples are, the front where all the fat quarters are located?

Another direction consideration is in free motion quilting:

1. When free motion quilting what direction do you keep your quilt?
2. Can you move the quilt vs move the machine? 
3. What direction do you push your quilt to stuff it into the harp/throat areas?
4. What advantage is a quilt rack/stand that moves the machine compared to moving the quilt?
5. What direction are your legs in, are you sitting or standing?
6. What direction do your shoulders go if you scrunch them up all the time quilting?

Other times to consider direction of quilting (not mentioned in the podcast):

1. What direction do you cut the fabric (lengthwise or crosswise grain)?
2. What direction are you moving your rotary cutter when you cut the grain?
3. What direction are your applique pieces that are stuck on the wrong side of your fabric?
4. What direction do you press the seams?

 

Instantaneous Velocity vs Average Velocity

Image from flickr,  By Allie_Caulfield

Instantaneous Velocity

• Instantaneous velocity and the hare
• Stopping projects midstream to work on something else (or take a nap)
• Working on quick projects that take minimal effort, learning time, materials
• Being satisfied for making a project quickly
• An instantaneous velocity of zero is still a velocity.
• Define the amount of time you want to define as “an instant”
• Are you okay with leaving in mistakes?
• Set up your equipment, tools, surroundings, sewing space to help maximize sewing time and minimize downtime
• Product based quilting – more projects = more things put on etsy = more chance to feed yourself

 

Image from flickr, by iregretjumping

Average Velocity

• In reality, for many projects, you may be facing time frames of years or months
• Slow and steady wins the race, just ask the tortoise
• Slowing down gives you more time to reflect, make changes, define the best techniques for your quilt
• The time it takes to gather the fabric, materials, learn the techniques, cut, sew, quilt & bind the quilt all adds in to the total quilting time for one project
• Pick up a new technique and try it.  Adds to your total quilting time and lowers your velocity, but can help you in the long run.

 

Frame of Reference

Referencing others

Wait a minute, everyone is finishing projects faster than me….

• Wow!  This is cool!  I should try to do more projects, sewing, etc.

or

• Oh no!  I don’t know how to work that fast!  How can I ever keep up?

Pick your attitude to help suit you best.  Keep in mind all the life distractions that you don’t want to / aren’t able to miss. 

Give yourself permission to be slower/faster than others depending on your unique situation and pressures.

You also may actually have a higher velocity of projects than other people.  If so, encourage or help others to finish up!

You can also reference yourself.

• Some people as they learn new techniques, can speed up over time because they aren’t referencing the source material as much.
• Some people find it more valuable to slow down as they gain more knowledge to be able to produce quilts with better quality. 
• Doing it right by spending a little more time on it may be more satisfying and save the headache of unsewing (negative project velocity)

 

Image from flickr, by garryknight 

Thanks for the comments.  We need to think of how much we want to sew, how quickly we need to sew, and what that will do to the final project. 

• Will we burn up our machine by literally going pedal to the metal? 
• Will we drag our feet to complete a project we don’t want to complete? 
• Will we put less value on our projects for ourselves than on the projects for others and put the effort into finishing things for others over finishing our own stuff?
• Will we regret sewing too fast and trying to get a project done in time?
• Will we sew fast enough to complete a project for a fellow swapper?

I had a blast at my very first quilting retreat lately.  I have been tearing it up getting a lot of quilting projects nearer to completion!

Are you a slow poke quilter too? Sign up and show off your slow quilting velocity!

  

Velocity Giveaway

Giveaway Details for the Great Velocity Experiment

We’re going to close on January 6th, 2011 to be considered eligible for the velocity experiment giveaway. 

If you find this site after that date, please feel free to participate by going to my Quilting Velocity Experiment page anyway!

At the current time, it will be easy to be eligible as we have very few entries!

Additional Music

From freesound.org

        By SirmXe 
            Twisted Feeling – Keys 140 BPM.mp3

From Mevio’s Music Alley

A Golden Day by Axel Schneider

Inner Focus by Absent Machine

Sands of Egypt by John Gillat

The Marionette by Two Star Symphony

Novellette in D Major by Mario Ajero

8.9 SQ Episode 18 – The Great Velocity Experiment – Part 1

Podcast Feed

Do you feel the need for speed?

Physics of Velocity

What is velocity?  Why not call this podcast – “Quilting Speed”?

Velocity is noted as speed and direction. 

What is speed?  Speed is the distance you travel and the amount of time it takes you to do so.

Velocity in physics is measured as both instantaneous and average.

Instantaneous velocity is the speed and direction you are at any given moment. 

Imagine you are driving  – or will be. Getting in your car, turning the key, you notice the car starts at rest.   

A velocity of zero.

You accelerate to a certain speed.  At any given instant between zero and your final speed your spedometer would read something different. An instantaneous velocity.

If you want to look at your average velocity during that same time period, consider the entire time period you were moving.  Then take your beginning speed, and your ending speed (going in the same direction) and take the average of the two. 

In our car, we are moving compared to the ground.

Compared to the ground.  A frame of reference.  The most common frame of reference is the ground.

If we were driving in a 4 lane highway, how fast do we appear to be driving compared to another car going faster?

Let’s say the other car is going faster, in the same direction we are. 

We’ll fall behind the other car, right?  We’re going to be late to the party. Hey, wait for us!

Doesn’t it appear that we are going backwards to the other car? 

We know we’re not going backwards, we can see we’re making progress forward compared to the ground, but making less progress compared to the faster car. 

But if you could see what your friend’s kid could see, looking back, seeing our slower car from the faster car’s perspective, our car would look like it is leaving us.  And the kids can make faces at us.

We can also have a negative velocity if we are considered to be ‘going backwards’ from where we intend to go. 

We can have a negative velocity compared to other vehicles.

So the study of velocity in physics starts you thinking about your speed, your direction, type of velocity measurement and your frame of reference, and these major terms can be applied to quilting.

  

Experimental Results

I’ve set up a separate page on my blog for the Great Velocity Experiment

I’ve created my own small scale experiment that measures the average velocity of a set number of strips.  And you can play along!  It’s easy.

You’ll really only need a number of strips or blocks that need sewing, a method to sew them, a timer, how many blocks or strips you have, and the length of 1 block or strip.

It is also nice to know what machine you use, what width of blocks you’re sewing (I found it makes quite a bit of difference), and you have to try to be accurate too!

Further details in the link above and in the show.  I am also including it on the side bar, and if I can figure out how to post a widget for you guys with blogs, I’ll let you know.

You DON”T HAVE TO DO any of the math, except to tell me the specifics I ask for, which the most math is measuring your block and counting the number of blocks, and I’ll do all the rest of the math for you!  What a deal!

And if you’re overseas and use meters instead of inches/yards (silly US system we have set up here), let me know that too.

I’ll do a giveaway to a lucky random person who participates! (Details to follow)

Wrap up

A few notes to wrap up part 1 of this podcast

THANK YOU for reaching out to me!!!  Thank you thank you thank you!

If you want some books I recently ‘read’ (listened to) about the brain and decisions (logical side and emotional side):

• How We Decide by Jonah Lehrer
• Switch by Dan and Chip Heath
• The Podcast Radiolab Episode on Choice by WNYC Jad Abumrad & Robert Krulwich in ITunes

 Gridlock Gridlock?  Try this technique at Sew Mama Sew suggested by Sally

Want to try a cross stitch pattern from a picture?  Try My Photo Stitch suggested by Deb

 Optical Illusion Quilt by Jane at Just Plain Jane Quilts

 

Additional Music

From Mevio

• Eric Kauschen – Speed of Light
• Josh Woodword – Once Tomorrow – Instrumental
• Gravity – Geoff Smith

From Freesound

       By genghis attenborough 
            Tornado jet.wav 
        By audible-edge 
            Driving in Streamwood IL with the windows down (05-04-2009).mp3 
        By Corsica_S 
            cleared_for_takeoff.wav