8 strategies for surviving the holidays with Free Motion Mavericks

Do you want to know the secret to surviving the holidays? These are my suggestions. BTW I can’t be held responsible if others in your family don’t approve of these great innovative ideas!

8 strategies for surviving the holidays

1. HIBERNATE! 

This is my favourite idea! Hide out in your quilting studio and don’t come out till the holidays are over – or better yet, when spring is in the air. If you just can’t swing this, try asking for at least one day to yourself, in your quilting studio during the holidays. Hopefully that will be enough to energize you for a while.


2.  Quilted gifts

I can hear you wondering how this is going to help you survive the holidays since this is possibly one of your major holiday stressors. My innovative idea – give the hardest to-shop-for person a quilty IOU. In a Christmas card or on a large gift tag, write down what their quilted gift will be (keep it general, small and realistic – they may actually expect you to deliver on this!)
Here are some ideas:

Make a microwavable fabric bowl

Make a fun pouch

Maybe try making a fabric basket!

Do they need a computer case?

3.  Decorating

Take out all of your Christmas quilts, runners and wall hangings and call the house decorated! If you really must have a tree, get two or three of your grandchildren, nieces and nephews, or neighbour's kids to help decorate the tree. You can get your tree decorated, feed them holiday sweets and then send them home before the sugar rush begins!

Take out all your holiday quilts

Enjoy those seasonal treasures

If the quilts are winter themed, they can stay up until spring!

Let the kids decorate the tree!

4.  Cooking 

Get yourself invited for Christmas dinner somewhere, pick up an amazing desert at your favourite local bakery and a bottle of wine. If you can’t pull this one off, consider cooking less. There are great places that make excellent food that you could buy for parts of your meal.


If you’re having people over, when they ask you what they can bring, instead of saying “Oh, don’t worry about it”, seriously consider letting them contribute. If they are really good at making something, give them the pleasure of making and sharing it with everyone.

5.  Shop the sales

While planning next year’s quilted IOU, have a glass of wine or a cup of tea, turn on (or off) the Christmas music and peruse the internet for fabrics you’ll need for that project. There are lot of sales, so make sure to pick up a few quilting gifts for yourself!

Pick up some yummy fabrics!

Find some great sales!

Follow Chevy's example!

6.  Sleep in

Even if you can't sleep in every day, give yourself permission to sleep in at least on one or two days.  If you're the type of person who wakes up at 6 am every day, consider getting up to make a coffee and then going back to bed with a great book. Give yourself permission to rest :-)

7. Pamper yourself

What is the one thing that you haven't done in ages that you used to love to do, before kids, work and responsibilities? It could be singing your heart out, dancing, going out with friends for a cup of coffee or tea or maybe even giving yourself a manicure (or better still getting someone else to give you one!) Take the time this holiday season to do something that makes you happy or makes you laugh. You deserve it!

8. Gratitude

No matter how busy or stressed this holiday season gets, remember that you are blessed with all kinds of wonderful people around you. You are also blessed with this amazing art that makes your soul sing! Be grateful for all that you have.

Gratitude makes everything better :-)

I hope that your Christmas / Holiday season is filled with love, joy, fun and peace.

Thanks for sharing this quilting journey with me,
love to all, Andrée
* This post is an update of my December 23, 2016 post "7 Ways to Survive the Holidays".

Linking parties
I'll be linking this post to many great linking parties. Let's see what's going on! GrammyDee's Themed linkup for Christmas trees and ornaments, Midweek Makers, Colour and Inspiration Tuesday, Put your foot down, Off the Wall Friday, Finished or Not Finished Friday, Peacock Party, Can I Get A Whoop Whoop?. Oh Scrap!, Slow Sunday Stitching, Monday Making, Design Wall Monday,

Free Motion Mavericks

If you have time to FMQ during the holidays, just DO IT! I'm hoping to take some time for R&R this holiday. That means a good book or two and a few quilty projects.

This is our last Free Motion Mavericks link up of 2019! The linking party will be open for two weeks and then Muv will start the new year fresh on January 2nd, 2020.

Thanks so much for linking up last time. We are starting to have a real party! This week's featured quilt is Sandra of mmm quilts' The Kelpie's Star. Sandra's quilting is amazing. I know that she uses a long arm to quilt it, but I think that she does FMQ on the long arm since she included one of Christina Cameli's FMQ design. I'm hoping that Sandra will let me know what the difference is, but no matter what, it's a really, really lovely quilt! Make sure that you check it out.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter