Taking DOWN our Christmas

Before I took all of my "homemade" Christmas down

I thought I'd take a picture of all my finished stockings..

This one is Brook's... and I must say fits her personality perfectly.

I saved the fur from one of her jackets she'd gotten rid of last year.

It had a zip-off collar so I unzipped it and kept the fun part. haha
space

I hung the stockings on the mantel in order of age..

Little Brady's (on the end) was a mixture of all the fabrics

from the other stockings..

Brenae had a high heel stocking with flowers

Brent got the manliest fabric I had... haha

(Brook informed me it wasn't very manly however!)

It was filled with presents and somehow he never even noticed.
space

Brad's was first, then mine, Jon's , Brenae's and Brent's.

This was the first year I've ever done stockings.

I think I had more fun finding presents to put in them

than I did doing the real gifts..

The kids LOVED having them..

I'm just gonna tell myself it's partly because they loved

their "homemade" stockings, but we both know

that it's really because they were filled with more stuff..

A GIRL can dream though!! haha
space

Next was one of our trees.

This one was in the living room with the stockings

so it too was a "homemade" work of Christmas.

Brook and I tied strips of all our left over fabric to make some garland.

Then I made little heart pillows and she stuffed them for me.

I added the rest of our circle flowers and some of my favorite pictures.

space

I had a few left over flowers so I sewed them onto a few of

the heart pillows. The rest of the "little" flowers I hot glued

on to the picture card corners to give it a little color.
space

They are the easiest things of all to make.
Literally an inch of left over fabric is enough to cut a circle out of.
Just layer a few circles of differing sizes and fabrics and
run 3 big stitches through it.
Pull them until they gather and tie a knot.
space
Here are a couple of samples of the "little" card ones,
and the bigger ones I used on the tree as ornaments.
space
I also made a GINORMOUS one for the tree topper this year.
Just start with several scraps of material and you're in business.
space
Put your largest circle on the bottom and start layering circles.
I staggered some of mine to give the bottom a leaf look.
space

Just keep adding circles of as many different fabric colors as you want.

I had lots of scrap pieces left over from the stockings so I just used mine all up.
space

When you get all the pieces you want add a piece to the middle that is

the color of the thread you are using.

You don't have to do this, but that way your stitches don't show.
space

Go up from the bottom and make big stitches.

Gather as you go or your thread will break.

(or mine does anyway)

space

Since this flower was so big,

I had to stitch and gather around some of the other circles as well.
space

You Can NOT mess this up !!

Just stitch and pull. It can be as tight or as loose as you want it to be.
space

Here is my finished TREETopper...

I must say... It was a fun change for our tree this year.

space

WWE had a wonderful Christmas in 2009...

And in my heart I smiled an extra giggle

knowing that we made most of it ourselves.

space

May we all end 2009 proud of our accomplishments.