Christmas Makings

For the good part of the past two months, when I've been home I've been working on making Christmas gifts.  I've talked about a few of them in recent yarn along posts, like the oodles of dish cloths that manifested on my knitting needles, and the ninja mask that Toad requested. I also found yarn in appropriate shades of orange and purple to make K2 a messy bun hat in the colors of her favorite college sports team: Clemson.

 But there has been so much more than just knitting going on.

I've also been cutting and sewing (and all the ironing that goes along with that).  And DH did some cutting and sanding in preparation for me to do some waterproofing.

What we ended up with was a whole lot of handmade gifts, some of which were planned out as far back as the Spring of 2017.  That is when we trimmed some branches from one of the black walnut trees that grow on our road frontage.

After aging a chosen branch for a good 18 months, DH used his miter saw to cut it into 1/2-inch disks, creating one of a kind wooden coaster sets for each of our kids, and even a set for ourselves.  It was my job to seal them on all sides, to help preserve them.

with first coat of polyurethane

(which freaked me out at first, because it went on milky white)

a finished set, sealed on all sides 

My sewing machine literally lived on the dining room table after Thanksgiving, when I went into full-on sewing mode.  The preliminary cutting had been completed, and now it was time for assembly. First off was a denim quilt for DD1 and Honorary Son.

It consists of 306 6" squares cut from old worn out jeans.  Those squares were then sewn into strips and the strips joined together to make the top.  It is queen sized.

aerial view from the stairs

flannel backing 

(chosen by DD1 this summer, when she though she was helping me choose fabric to repair my own denim quilt)

remembering how to do daisy stitch, 

I embroidered the year on one of the denim squares

That quilt was the largest sewing project I did this year.  After that, I did much faster items.  Like sewing up a plethora of microwavable bowl potholders.  Each child and their spouse/significant other got one, and no two were the same.  I tried to customize the fabrics to the intended recipient.

Once those were done, I made two sets of oven mitts; one I had cut out (but not sewn) a few years ago for DD1, and a set for DD2.  I forgot to take pictures of the pair for DD1 before wrapping them, but I did get a couple quick pics of the set for DD2.

front sides

back sides

I also made up a couple of hot pads for DD2, out of some fat quarters she'd admired the day the girls and I were at a large fabric store last summer.

front

back

It feels great to be giving so many customized gifts this year.  It feels even better to not be working on them tonight--I finished the last one yesterday!  Now it's time to relax, concentrate on the reason for the holiday, and to enjoy getting together with my family.

Yarn Along: December

I am joining Ginny today for this month's Yarn Along.

Last month, I had found a dish cloth pattern that was perfect for using up scrap yarn.  Well, it kind of became addictive matching up colors in my (rather large) bag of leftover cotton yarn and turning them into more dish cloths. What started out as maybe making a couple turned into me having to literally rip myself away so that I might actually get some of my planned Christmas crafting done.

At current count, I have eight new dish cloths, all from leftovers.  Most will be tucked into Christmas packages (so I didn't totally waste time, right?).  Depending on how the next two weeks go and how many other projects I get completed, I have color combos for about three more dish cloths picked out.

I have knit little on my Glacial socks in the past month.  Mostly due to getting hooked on making all those dish cloths!  I did finish the first sock and get a decent start on the second one. These will just have to see a January finish date.

Meanwhile, I have started a balaclava, aka Ninja Mask, for Toad.  He's all about ninjas lately, and has been begging me to make him ninja mask.  So, onto the Christmas project list went a ninja mask "in green, because blue isn't my favorite color anymore; it's green now".  I am using this pattern so far, and will make changes if needed now that I'm to the eye part.

I haven't done much reading at all lately.  I've been sick in one form or another for going on three weeks now. So there's been a lot of sleeping (the first 4 days), and some catching up on work and chores, etc, for a few days, then a whole lot of coughing (and a visit to Urgent Care for meds) for past 8 days.  I've either been too ill to read, or, on the good days, too busy trying to get normal things done to spend much time in a book.