Tim and Sally's Christmas Stockings

It is officially December now so the tree is up and it's time to enjoy an advocaat (it's a family tradition!). Woo.

 

I can also reveal my latest Christmas Stockings. OOOOooh! I sewed both of these in an evening. I couldn't bring myself to cut up the Winter Wonderland fabric so I simply quilted the fronts in a criss-cross pattern using the fab Christmas Cotton. I think the cotton and fabric go perfectly together. It's the first time I've used a stripy cotton and I really like the effect here. What do you think?

 

 

How cute it that deer?

 

Then it was simply as case of sewing everything together, the linings are made from the fabric I bought at the Knitting and Stitching Show. I cut the linings a bit longer than the fronts so that I could create a nice cuff. Tim's has the grey cuff, mine is the red.

 

 

Here they are pinned up on the fireplace awaiting Father Christmas' visit!

 

 

 



The Knitting and Stitching Show

I set my alarm for 7am this morning (I know, on a Saturday!) so that I could be in Harrogate in time for the start of the Stiching and Knitting Show. Tim was less than impressed. I was expecting massive queues but as we'd arrived so early we were pretty much the first people there. Oops. Here I am (feeling a bit of a prat) outside the Harrogate International Centre waiting for the show to start.

 

It was actually really lovely to get there so early as it meant we could mooch around the stalls easily and really look at the fab products on show. I had it in mind that I'd try and find some fabric to go with the Winter Wonderland fabric I bought yesterday for mine and Tim's Christmas stockings.

 

I ended up buying a fat quarter of these two fabrics at pretty much the first stall. Yay me! Tim chose the grey one as it features mushrooms (his Dad is a fungi specialist!) I got the red one with the birds.

 

 

Both of the fabrics are by Annela Hoey for Moda. The red fabric is Cherry Christmas -  Cherry Robin and the grey is A Walk in the Woods - Birds on Apples. So cute.

 

My only other purchase was a meter of a red large spot fabric. Not sure who its by, but I thought it would tie in with the other fabrics.

 

 

I had hoped to buy some fabric for the backing to Emma's Quilt but I just didn't see anything that was perfect! I'm happy though we had a lovely day out. We managed to escape just as it was getting busy, so Tim was happy. I also bought him a bun from Betty's teashop on the walk back to the car. What a lovely wife I am.

Emma's Christmas Stocking

I've had a lovely day with my sister and niece. I've literally just walked in the door but I have to share with you the Christmas stocking. It's turned out really fab and even gained Emma's seal of approval!

 

The entire project took about 2 or 3 hours. Here is Vicky cutting out the fabric (we drew round Vicky's shop bought Christmas stocking to get the right shape). Vicky had a lovely red gingham from a previous craft project which we used for the lining.

 

 

We had a very captive audience in the form of Emma, who found the whole process fascinating but especially the sewing machine. We hardly heard a peep from her. Here she is checking that the batting is up to scratch. Sorry about the drool, she'd cut her first tooth today - so exciting!

 

 

Here's me at the machine adding a few finishing touches. We inadvertently deviated from the pattern, so had to add a binding on. Oops.

 

 

Here is the final stocking, we added a big letter E (for Emma) using the same green fabric as the backing. Vicky still wants to blanket stitch round the letter for a bit of extra decoration and add a jingle bell, but otherwise it's done!

 

Now we just have to hope that Emma has been a good girl this year...!

UPDATE!

Here is the totally finished stocking, blanket stitched and jingling!