Making Me Smile - 50/52

The decorations are up!  In spite of the grainy pics the room does look pretty, if a little more cluttered than my preference for the other eleven and a half months of the year.

I love our tree decorations and lights but have never ever been able to take a decent picture of them.  There are handmade decorations that I love. decorations I bought on our honeymoon, my absolute favourite glass decorations (pears and long glass ice drops), sweet pressies from friends and of course a few of those "wouldn't part with them even though they do nothing for my tree" decs made by DS.  A Christmas tree becomes imbued with memories and stories (a little bit of our history, I suppose) as we gather our bits and pieces over the years and I think that's what I love so much about it now.

This week's efforts

This week I have been monkeying around 

and the builders have been in ...

I tried to (sort of) make a start thinking about Christmas and the lists of things that need done.  My sewing list was empty for quite a while as I declared (to myself) I wasn't going to do the handmade Christmas thing / put myself under the pressure this year.  But I'm not very strong willed and now my list is looking rather healthier than I had wanted!

Meet Charlie, my first ever sock monkey, so named for his rather impressive ears.  I'm sure he will be renamed, if named at all, by his new owner once gifted.  Inspired by Indianna Dreams' recent post, he was a trial just to see if I could actually make one of these things.  I had an idea that if he was successful I'd have a go at making some more for the girls on my Christmas list.  Now that I'm happy that I know what I'm doing, even though I might reduce his ears a bit and try to eliminate the lumpy bumpy cellulite effect on his legs,  there is a 3 pack of girls' socks awaiting my attention for early December.

The builders may have trailed out all sorts of gubbins and created chaos in the sewing room but it was all in aid of these wee cuties.  All three will be gifted (even if they would look nice on my tree when we put it up) as a Secret Santa, hostess gift and the middle one will be the tree decoration to accompany my Modern Quilt Guild of Ireland Table Runner swap efforts.  Couple more ticks off the list!  (The swap runner is almost complete, hope to show you that soon.)

ETA - I forgot to list the tutorial for the little houses when I posted originally.  It's the Home for the Holidays tutorial by retro-mama and there's a very handy pdf pattern linked in her tute too.  I printed it at 75% to make the houses a wee bit smaller, though next time I'd probably just stick to the original size.

Tonight I am turning my attention to this sweet stack of fabric.  There has been a new arrival in my extended family and a quilt has been promised.  The brief from baby's granny (my aunt) is that the fabrics should be soft autumnal colours since the nursery has little woodland creatures and owls featuring.  I think (hope) that this lot will fit in nicely and there is a gorgeous gold fox flannel fabric for the backing but I don't know where the pic went.  Anyway, I'd best get on with it if I'm ever going to get through a baby quilt and a Christmas list in the next few weeks!

Hope your list is filled with fun things to be stitching and not too much stress - who am I kidding?

My Christmas Decorations

You will have gathered that I like to indulge in my Christmas makes.  I think that Christmas decorations allow for so much more play and creativity and fuss than my normal style and that's what I enjoy so much about making for the festive period.  It seems to unleash my inner child.  This year I added the ultimate Christmas make to my collection - my Comfort and Joy quilt.

Gratuitous pic just to show it off again!

But I thought I'd show you some of my oldies - makes from years long past that predate my quilting days.  I'm going to say very little (are you relieved?) and just let you see the Christmas items I have created for our home.

Cross-stitch advent calendar - have lost the wee doodah that's supposed to hang on the date.

Cross-stitch banner

Knitted snowman

Noel Cross-stitch banner

Gift Sacks and Christmas Stocking - made from guess work before I knew
what I ought to have been doing.  Don't think I'd heard of applique
stitching at that time - these are all just bondawebbed in place - eek!

Santa and his Mrs

Normally I hate clowns, but this one just appealed to me in my knitting phase.
The postbox is my favourite though!

She is an angel, NOT a fairy OK?!

Would I make all of these again today?  No, probably not, but would I part with them?  No way.  These makes have history, reasons and sentiment attached no matter how lovely, tacky, twee they may be.

Bet you all have some of those too - you can't all just have cool Christmas decorations! (Please tell me I'm not alone.)

My favourite Christmas decoration is not something I have made myself though, and it's not colourful or "festive", but is what it's all about after all -

And, just so you can see my very latest Christmas creation ...

Customised slings anyone?


PS - Watch out for something special in this space on Tuesday!