Snowflake Crochet Pillow

I stitched this Snowflake Crochet Pillow this week. Fortunately, it isn't that cold here yet, but it's time to retire some old holiday pillows I have for some new winter decorations.



The pattern was in Crochet Today last winter, but I found the pattern online. Click HERE.



The snowflake was kind of hard. I kept getting mixed up and ripping it out until I started using the chart provided with the pattern. It took a long time to applique it onto the pillow!



Crochet Today is published by Coats so the projects are mostly using their inexpensive yarn like Red Heart acrylic or Aunt Lydia's Crochet Thread. I'm coming around to the Red Heart Acrylic. It isn't nice for stuff next to your skin, but it is inexpensive, sturdy with no dye lots. It's nice for amigurumi, home dec., and scrubbers.

Christmas Prep

This time of year is so busy! We try to keep things low key, but I dunno. It is just the time of year when everything happens all at once.

Remember, when things look wonky, another word for that is "charming". Case in point, our star topper:


I don't know about you all, but we didn't adjust that much with our gifts this year. Mostly because we did all that adjusting awhile ago. We don't exchange with nearly as many people as we used to and it is much easier. I put a lot of pressure on myself to make a bunch of things and I don't need to do that. I like the Handmade Pledge and all, but sometimes buying practical things like lotions, lip balm, and socks is really simple and easy and eases the time pressures of the season.

Of course, the season isn't really about the gifts for us. We have fun every night doing Advent readings, singing, and stories with our kids. We've been attending a new church and are happy to see that our children are connecting with the bible stories and theology in nice ways that they haven't before.

Here is a glimpse of some of what I've been making. I can't say what these things are for fear of discovery!



The gift below involved lots of little snaps. I am mad at the manufacturer Dritz. I just might boycott them. $2.50 for 7 size 16 (tiny) snaps?!? My friends, that is only 7 halves of the snaps, so in a package you only get 3.5 snaps! *grumble* The Prim company (available at WalMart) charges about $1.50 for an actual full set of 7 snaps. Maybe I'll get my revenge and write an article about snap buying woes at Craft Critique. I ended up using both of those types from the notions stores and found that they are interchangeable and then I ordered a big bunch of different snaps online to use later.



I thought I could put away my sewing machine and then I remembered that I wanted to make these:


Finally, I got a couple of pom pom makers for my birthday this fall. They are so fun! I'm using up my fuzzy acrylic making a stack of them to use on our gifts:


Overnight tonight we expect a foot of snow with a inch of sleety ice mixed in. I'm about 80% certain my children will not have school tomorrow. I hope to get some baking done! Granola and pumpkin bread! Mmmm... This weekend is our favorite holiday party at John's and our McKee family Christmas. Nana comes on Monday. Yay!

Merry Christmas!

That's my favorite Christmas ornament. I picked it out when I was about 3 years old and it's lasted all these years.

I'm still wrapping gifts and stitching up some last minute things that I doubt I'll be able to photograph. I made 2 of THESE today to hold the Jolly Rancher candies my children always long for and I never buy. I made a cool simple item for my mom and her travels, but it's a secret!

We stay home for Christmas and we want our family to know that we love and miss them and look forward to seeing them at less stressful times during the year!

Enjoy the holidays!

Hello Kitty wishes you a Merry Christmas!

School's Out!

We just finished my daughter's holiday party at school. Of all the activities I over-prepared, I'm most happy with this snowman craft.



We had to have something that a small group could do in about 10 minutes and this was just the thing. I got stick on google eyes and I prepared the felt hats, scarves, and paper punch colored buttons ahead of time. The snowmen are cotton balls.



This was a good use for the acrylic felt I'm not so fond of, although the quality really varies with this type of craft felt. I wish I knew what brands these are, so I know what to avoid and what to purchase in the future.

I've got enough supplies leftover to make about 20 or 30 more of these.. maybe we'll do it again at next year's party.

The next holiday job to tackle is baking for the neighbors. I think I'm making some gingerbreads, but who knows? I passed out some really delicious lemon curd too, so I might make that. My husband and I are also nowhere near done with our shopping although we've already exchanged with most people except the intimate family we'll be with on Christmas Day.

Tree!

Our son came home from school demanding to know when we were doing our tree: "Christmas is in 8 DAYS!"

"Talk to your father."



We did it! We got the tree up. Honestly, it goes faster than all the other decorating we do. (What am I saying? I do all the decorating, except the tree.) Since the tree pretty much sits right in the middle of the living room, I don't want to deal with it for an entire month. My daughter has her own little tree upstairs that she decorates by herself. When she was younger, she just hung some of her little toys on it.


The kids still always hang their ornaments in one spot on the tree, although they are getting better about it. Our tree is totally full of ornaments. I learned a long time ago to have a Sharpie handy to put the year they each were received or made. Our son thought it was cool to climb under the tree and hang ornaments on the underside.... I had to move those. It isn't finished until we get my Grandma M's thread crochet snowflakes on the tips of the branches.

Now that the tree is up, we move our nightly advent ritual into that room. We even drag out our Christmas Carol songsheets. The kids are so excited! Doing all these rituals is a great way to take the focus off of gifts and Santa for the kids. I am not at all against Santa though. We don't find that Santa interferes with our spiritual goals at all.

My house looks so dark in photos.... I still haven't found the magic setting on my camera.

Christmas Q & A

My friend Sarah just posted this Q&A. I like to read about how other people handle the holidays so here goes:

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? Wrapping Paper.. I don't like storing the gift bags over the rest of the year.

2. Real tree or artificial? Artificial.. we have limited space and the artificial tree is more narrow at the bottom. I also always forget to water a real tree and then I worry about the giant dry fire hazard of a dead pine tree...

3. When do you put up the tree? Late in the month. I do all the other decorating first and then we have a special night with the kids and do the tree.


4. When do you take the tree down? First week of January.

(The perils of cutting and pasting.. #5 was missing!)

6. Favorite gift received as a child? Hmm... I always got great gifts as a child.... We had a funny tradition of new socks and underwear, and my mom used to give me various kinds of gourmet chocolate... yum!


7. Do you have a Nativity scene? YES! I have dozens... they are handcrafted from all over the world, but they are a pain to set up. All our books have to be stored away so the bookcases are clear for them. We really play up Advent with our children.

8. Hardest person to buy for? Anyone who says they want gift cards... I hate exchanging gift cards and refuse to do it anymore. My policy is that I really don't care if someone wants to return my gift for the money, but we are going to go through the ritual of picking something out and wrapping it up.


9. Easiest person to buy for? Our own kids.

10. Worst Christmas Gift you ever received? All my Christmas gifts have been perfect! ;)

11. Mail or email Christmas cards? Mail, but I give myself a pass and this is the last thing I do for Christmas. My cards usually are Happy New Year cards. Just to get the word out: I love those photocopied newsletters about what you were up to this year! Please send those along! When we just get a photo, I always wonder what my out-of-town friends have been up to.

12. Favorite Christmas Movie? I cannot list one favorite movie in any category. I like A Christmas Story, Meet Me In St Louis, It's A Wonderful Life, Elf, The Nativity Story...(Actually, I can name one favorite movie in one particular category: My favorite Arnold Schwarzenegger movie is Conan the Barbarian...)

13. When do you start shopping for Christmas? I get serious after Thanksgiving.

14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? Hmmm... maybe...;)

15. Favorite things to eat at Christmas? Treats! Endless treats! And the cheese fondue our friend John serves at his annual tree trimming party.

16. Clear lights or colored on the tree? Clear, because our tree is pre-lit, but I like the colored lights best.

17. Favorite Christmas song or album? We have a Billboard Christmas album that is our favorite.. it's actually a cassette tape

18. Travel at Christmas or stay home? We stay HOME. Hooray!

19. Can you name all of Santa’s reindeer? Yes!

20. Angel on the tree top or a star? Star

21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning? One on Christmas Eve and then the rest in a marathon on Christmas morning.

22. Most annoying thing about this time of year? Everything happens all at once.

23. What is the “silliest” family tradition you do, or miss doing? When I was a kid, we had small family Christmases, so my mom made up some little traditions. The silliest was that we always baked an angel food cake and put our number 1 birthday candle on it and sang Happy Birthday to Jesus.

24. Ugliest Christmas Decoration ever invented? They are all great! I have to say that I think it is really boring in some upper class communities when they only put up tasteful white lights and green garland outside... I like color and some silly inflatable lawn ornaments!

25. Which looks best, theme trees or homey trees? Homey all the way!

26. Gingerbread or sugar cookies? Gingerbread with lemon icing



I'm not in this photo. My spot is the empty place on the sofa. Happy Holidays!

Elf Clogs

I did some elf clogs too! These are for my friend Ginny and her new husband, Joe.



PATTERN and FLICKR GROUP

Stockings are up!

I had some nice fair isle sweaters from my last trip to the Salvation Army store. I was saving them to make totes, but really... We need some cute Christmas stockings.



Ours hang in our entryway along the staircase. The one on the far left still needs it's cuff... I added the poinsettia because they needed a little bit of pizazz and something to unify them a bit. The poinsettia is one that was a paper craft project I did with my students (back in my "past life" as a teacher) at holiday time when we studied holiday celebrations in Mexico. I always loved this poinsettia pattern and wanted to do it in felt. It's not like me to use glue very much, but these are put together with fabric glue and I expect to just tack stitch them to the stockings sometime before Santa arrives.

Here's a tip for sewing with felted sweaters: The curved seams looked terrible and wonky when I turned them for the heels and toes of each stocking. They just needed a little blocking and now they look fine. Blocking is when you dampen the wool with water and shape the wool as desired and let it dry.


My son likes reading my blog so he'll want you to know that he had his first band concert last night. About half of his fifth grade signed up for the band so there were about 250 students playing at his first concert. Since they've only been playing for about 6 weeks, they managed things like "Mary Had A Little Lamb" and "Hot Cross Buns". His teacher is terrific so the kids were very proud and well behaved. It was great fun!

Christmas Fabric Trees

These are our handmade ornament for this year. The pattern is over at The Small Object HERE. They are super easy, although you do need to use interfacing and a sewing machine zig-zag stitch. My daughter picked out some wild combinations and we are stitching some up for her to give to her teachers. I put a pom-pom and a string on mine. I also found that a pom-pom between the layers also gives a better staggered effect.



We did a first round of Christmas with my brother and his family. I had time to use some tartan plaid fabric strips as ribbon and those tags are the Christmas Dangles from Jenny B at Allsorts HERE.

Ever had an awkward gift to wrap? We had a hula hoop to give our niece and I just wrapped it up in extra fabric. My brother told his daughter that it was a "Portable Particle Accelerator" so she could have her own playtime Fermi Lab.

December 1

It's snowing and the weather is appropriately cozy for this time of year. I sent my kids out in their snowpants to clean up their toys from the yard (yes we are procrastinators, and a little bit messy...)

Happy Birthday to our beloved Nana!

Here's the garland that I made from the pattern by Jenny B. If we had a mantle, I'd hang it from there, but this ledge is where our advent wreath will go and the staircase ledge is where the stockings hang. Our house is one where Santa has to come in the front door...





I used a variety of vintage style red buttons on the little pouches. Now I'm making the little fabric trees posted at The Small Object. So cute, but I have to go down into the depths of the basement to get the best fabric combinations from my stash.

The maid service cost a small fortune. Such a luxury! It was money well spent and I'm really in the Christmas Spirit now.