In this episode, I share a quick tip to help you get through old WIP projects. You can listen to the episode below or keep scrolling to read it instead.

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Get through old WIP projects

This tip comes from Gab inside The Cross Stitch Club, and I thought it was brilliant. I have even implemented it as a part of the club now.

She shared that this year, she is pulling out an old project to work on each month. And at the end of the month, she puts one away and gets out a different old project. She knows she might not get them finished this way, but they are definitely not going to get finished sitting in a box forever, either.

I know we all have a box of projects that we have put down for whatever reason. The seasons changed, we ran out of floss, or we just plain got bored with them. The reasons don’t matter too much, but we can give those projects a second chance if we want to.

And the best thing? This is so easy to plan for the whole year! So if you want to work on some of your old WIPs, keep reading for some ideas on how to do it.

Pull them all out

The first thing you need to do is pull them all out. We are now heading into March, which means we have 10 full months of stitching for the rest of the year, so you need 10 projects. If you don’t have 10 old WIPs, that’s fine, just use what you have. If you have more than 10, just pick the 10 that look most exciting to you right now. No need to overcomplicate it because you can also change what you have picked, if you want to.

Write them in a list

Write them down in a list format. Just name them something you will remember; it doesn’t have to be perfect.

Here is my example list. Some of these are projects I will be pulling back out, and others I included as examples:

• Tea and Cake
• Christmas Coffee Shop
• Rose Apothecary
• Sweet Shop
• Market Day
• Christmas Craft Shop
• Bookshop
• Hello Spring
• Woodland Wander
• Welcome Witches

Decide what month

Now decide what month you will work on each project. I think stitching in season for these would work well, as the goal is not to finish them, but just work on them. So stitch Christmas projects in December and Spring projects in March/September, depending on your hemisphere. You can then rewrite your list in order or just leave it as is.

If you have fewer than 10 projects, you can stitch one project for longer, such as 2 months or spread them out. Have the same project in April come back out in September, for example.

Here’s my rearranged list:

• March – Hello Spring

• April – Rose Apothecary
• May – Tea and Cake
• June – Sweet Shop
• July – Market Day
• August – Bookshop
• September – Woodland Wander
• October – Welcome Witches
• November – Christmas Coffee Shop
• December – Christmas Craft Shop

Pack 2-3 months ahead

By “pack”, I mean sort these projects into bags with the floss you need for each one, 2-3 months at a time. For me, that looks like sorting Hello Spring, Rose Apothecary and maybe Tea and Cake. This means that at the end of the month, your next project is ready. And at the end of 2-3 months, you can rearrange your supplies for the next batch of projects.

Don’t worry about what you get done

As I said at the start, the goal here is not to get these projects finished; it’s just to work on them. Like the container technique from the last episode, we are using a container of time to work on each project and then putting them away.

These projects are not meant to replace any others you have planned for the year. There are bonus projects. You might only get to work on them one day out of the month, and that is OK because hopefully that means you are stitching other projects you are excited about instead.

Stitching beyond the month

It might get to the end of the month, and you are really loving working on an old project, and you don’t want to put it away. This might especially happen if you are close to being finished. It is totally up to you what you do. The point of stitching is to always enjoy it, so if you are enjoying that project, carry on! Just know that if you do, it might mean the other old WIPs you had on your list will be relegated back to the box this year.

Thank you again to Gab for this wonderful idea! I have been trying it myself, and it’s like starting a new project, pulling those old ones out, which I love.

Extra episodes and posts

• How to Make a Cross Stitch Routine
• How to Organise Your WIP Projects
• How to Plan and Organise Your Craft Projects
• Hobbies I’m Planning This Christmas
• Set a Container for Cross Stitch