Christmas Quilting

Now that my family has received their Christmas gifts, I can post the two quilts I made.

Five years ago (wow) I gave my brother and sister-in-law a set of monthly seasonal wall hangings -- minus the November and December that I didn't get finished on time. I figured I had 10 months to finish those two, so no sweat.

Life intervened, and it took about 4 (?) years to give them the November. I wasn't wild about the December pattern, so I finally redesigned it this year and got it to them by mid-December. Yea! Complete set!

The triumph is somewhat dampened by the fact that I still have the December and January wall hangings to complete for myself.

I made a quilt for my mom for Christmas. I really loved how it turned out. I embroidered the center blocks, then used them for a class I took at the local quilt shop some years ago.  I then let them 'marinate' for the appropriate amount of time before setting them in the coordinating fabric I had managed to not cut into and finished it in the summer - hallelujah! - well before Christmas, so that hand-made gift was stress-free.

Handsome quilt holder!



Mom is still debating on whether she will hang the quilt or continue to snuggle under it. I'm glad she likes it!!!

Lola definitely had the Christmas spirit:

Patrick won't let her wear the sweater outside because he thinks she'll get picked on by the neighborhood dogs.

Belated Christmas Posting

I finished this ornament before the holidays, but didn't get a chance to post it. I really loved how it turned out. I found the pattern free online somewhere. My daughter started it sometime earlier this year and I finished stitching it up and finished it with some felted wool and chenille trim.

Ta Da moment

Right before the holidays I finished "Give Me A Home" by The Sunflower Seed. 

It's stitched on my hand dyed cotton  using either the specified GAST or DMC threads. If there was just a spot or so of color, I used the DMC.

Our photographer at work turned me onto a new framer in town, so I'm going to give it a whirl and frame my 'Kansas' and my 'Texas' samplers.

What I'm Working on Wednesday

I had the chance to sew a little bit this weekend and worked on putting the red triangles onto my 2" square units for the classic strippy Bonnie Hunter quilt I'm working on.

I've only got about 10 more to go.....

My first ornaments

I've been getting a lot of craft time in during the mornings when my son and I hang out and watch the news for about 30 minutes. I actually got to cross stitch something Christmasy during the season and I got them finished up this weekend.

I love these two decorations. I made them all with leftover stuff I had hanging around.

The little pillow is from Blackbird Designs Joyeux Noel book. I backed it with a recycled sweater I felted and filled it with crushed walnut shells. The tiny squirrel is from the 2011 Just Cross Stitch Christmas Ornament magazine. It's also backed with felted recycled wool, but it's a flat ornament.

Secret Santa Scarf

We drew names for a Secret Santa exchange at work. We are an office of all women except for the student workers we have, so I knew I'd be able to make something that would be very well received.

I decided to make a crochet ribbed scarf, and I bought some lovely bamboo blend yarn when we were out of town. I started stitching the base row in the car and I guess I didn't really get a good measure of how long it was getting. It turned out super long, and the woman I made it for is pretty petite.

Ellen, who's 5'8" is modeling. Oops!

But it's so soft and squishy, the recipient loved it anyway. She doubled and quadrupled it around her neck and wore it all day!

Here it is before blocking:

The texture is so wonderful after blocking.

I will definitely make this pattern again. I want some super soft bamboo yarn of my own!

Lola thinks Finnegan is softer than a bamboo scarf:

Holiday scarf

There is a blog I read and enjoy called, Confessions of a Serial Starter, and if that name hadn't already been appropriated, I would reserve it for my daughter, for sure. She has such enthusiasm for projects that you can't help get caught up in it with her, but then other parts of her teenage life take priority and the cross stitch she began to commemorate her driver's ed or the string quilt blocks or the Christmas yarn scarf get put on the back burner.

Since I had found that easy lace crochet scarf pattern, I told her that if she could locate her yarn, I would make a scarf for her. I pulled out all two rows of another pattern she had begun and made this for her:

It was my first time to make fringe on a scarf and she loved it.

And as you can see, it looks good on just about anybody: