Christmas Stuff for me

With all of the presents out of the way, I have now done some Christmas sewing for us. I know that it is the 4th of December already, but an Advent Calender is still in order. I've never even participated in such an event let alone made one, and am not really sure about increasing the Christmas anticipation in the house any further...those concerns aside I made it anyway. I flogged the pattern from a Spotlight Creative magazine (possibly last year's Christmas edition) that I picked up for $1. It was also a new experience sewing with felt, which I would have to say was fantastic, and now I'll have to dream up projects to do with all the left over. Anyway without any further ado, here is the piece, please excuse the ruler at the top I'm waiting for the man of the house to return to cut some dowel. We also have to restock the pantry with Santa chocies and find some candy canes, the ones purchased on Monday seem to have disappeared!This calender isn't nearly as fancy as the one krafty kuka (see blog list) has done - check it out.

Last night I finished our tree skirt with some left over fabric from making a Santa stocking for a gift. The fabric is fairly traditional for the skirt, but I couldn't be bothered making the day's trek around to find something funky. Again, never really considered a tree skirt for the house, but I think the desire to sew something is beginning to overrule rational thought for what we really need. It also annoys me slightly that the skirt is based on a gold theme and our decorations are all beautifully co-ordinated silver, white, pastel pink and blue. But with some presents over it, I'm sure my discomfort will soon pass.

Before I log off, the story of the stocking is an interesting one. The picture below has two stockings, the one at the front is the recently completed one for a Christmas gift and the rear stocking was made for boy-child last Christmas. Last year's stocking was the first project that I had made on the sewing machine for nearly twenty years, and I was at my Dad's place on a scorching hot summer afternoon. I think it took nearly 4 hours to sew and the pattern instructions seemed like they were written in Finnish, and even after all that care I made an error in the last bit. This year I made the same version in 1.5 hours, the pattern instructions were needed a bit and with no mistakes. It really shows that persistence is worth it in this game.