A Handmade Christmas

Just a few projects this year, but I thoroughly enjoyed each one.

As I make something for someone, I love that I often spend the time thinking of them also.

This handstitched (except for the rickrack) wallhanging was for Mom.

As I made it, I remembered each time she'd walk by the one hanging on my wall and tell me that, one day, I'd notice that it was missing and now hanging on her wall. Now she has her own. I was so happy to find this frame (at Micheals); it went so well with

the wallhanging.

My sister-in-law, Ann, received a 22 page 8x8 scrapbook
of her family's photo session with the oh-so-talented Kyla
I love to scrapbook her photos.
These photos brought back memories from
their visit here last summer when Paul and Emma trashed
the house while the two daddies watched them.

My brother-in-law, Greg, got a padded

camo camera bag. As I made this, memories of our summer

trip to La Grande came to mind. It was during this trip that I saw Greg pull his camera out

of the original bubble wrap to take a photo and thought, "Hmmmm, I think he

needs a camera bag."

This little guy and I became great friends.

I made six of him and then neglected to make one for myself. Oops!

This was my largest and probably favorite gift to work on.

I've discovered that I thoroughly love quilting, even as I was in the midst

of the 4500 inches of stitching (machine, thankfully) required to quilt this.

It was supposed to be a lap quilt, but grew into an almost-twin sized quilt.

The design is my own, and I picked out the fabric on my own this time. I usually

enlist Mom's expertise when choosing fabric.

This was for my sister-in-law, Holli. As I sewed it, I pictured her

cuddled on the couch, toasty warm, watching her favorite TV shows.

I just accidently erased the photo of the back of the quilt, and my laptop won't let me

move photos, so this one will have to do. The backing is totally made up of the multi-colored fabric, except for a 4" strip about a third of the way down of the other two prints. You can just see it on the top left of this photo. Once again, I used masking tape to do the quilting and then washed the quilt after it was completed. I love the texture this gives the quilts (and it also means that I don't have to wait while the fabric is prewashing and drying. I'm kinda

impatient to start projects once I get the supplies).

Last, but not least, is a small MP3 bag for my nephew, Jordan.

It will clip to his jeans, backpack, or whatever's handy.

As I was making this, I thought back on all of the fishing weekend

memories Ryan has with Jordan and how lucky they are to have each other.

~~~