Christmas stockings done

My sister will be glad to know that I finished these stockings and they are going in the mail TODAY!

These two snow-people look so happy.

And here's another happy guy, Leo, visiting Santa Claus last Saturday.  The Lab Rescue of NC group does a fundraiser "Picture with Santa" that we love to attend.

Edited on Friday, Dec. 20th:

I originally made this pattern of stockings back in 2009, blogged about it here.  It was from an on-line pattern I found at http://everydaycelebrate.blogspot.com/2008/11/tutorial-lined-stocking.html.

The stockings are so easy--you cut out four pieces, pile them one layer on top of the other, then sew the edges, and turn.  The cuff around the top is sewn on separately.   The snowman faces were my personal touch, but you could easily adapt to whatever you wanted to create.

Hooking up today with Off The Wall Friday.

December Blahs

Here it is already December 5th, where did 2013 go??  In the last week, we've had a dusting of snow, temps down into the teens over the weekend, and now it's almost 70 degrees out.  Hard to tell what season it is, it doesn't really seem like Christmas could be so close.

I've been working on a piece for the PAQA-South show, ArtQuilts Whimsey, with a submission deadline of March 1st, and a juried show in April.  Entry is open to everyone, check out the link for more information.
I'm trying out some things I haven't done before, so it's been an adventure--luckily I still have a couple of months to get this completed.

And been doing more rug hooking, working on a little Sunset piece that I might frame or make into a pillow.

And making some potholders using the fabric my little granddaughter Madelyn painted when she was here this summer.  I figure it's a nice gift for her Mom and paternal grandma, and they're easy to make--I've had the InsulBrite stuff for two years now, it's about time I used it!

 And more dyeing of wool, using a simple technique.. wool is so much easier to dye than cotton.

It's totally dark by the time I get home from work at this time of year--so it seems so much later than it really is.  But I do love the sun coming up early in the morning, as I wake up at 5:00 every day and work on something before leaving for work.  Another couple of weeks of going to the office, then we get some time off for Christmas.  Can't wait!

Updating this to include a link to Nina Marie Sayre's blog and Off The Wall Friday.

Dyeing Wool and Getting Sidetracked

I seem to get sidetracked so easily--my "plan" was to finish up all my UFOs before the end of the year and start fresh for next year...but I had some wool felt that I bought at Joann's Fabrics a long time ago, and it was just a plain off-white color.  Since Procion MX dyes don't work on wool, and I really didn't want to spend a bunch of money on a whole new line of acid dyes, I learned from some on-line research that I could use Wilton icing colors (concentrated gel) and mix with Fruit Fresh (ascorbic acid) and dye wool with it.   I used my Joann's coupon and got the gel colors there, and already had the fruit fresh because I can pears and peaches every summer.

I took two small pieces of the wool felt, and cut shapes like circles and ovals in one which I then dyed with a combination of blues/greens/purples using the icing gel and Fruit Fresh combo.  The other one I left whole and dyed orange.  (If I do this again, I'll leave the pieces whole and dye first, then cut out the shapes--I don't know why I did it the way I did--now I have a bunch of white ovals and circles that I'm going to have to dye to use.)  I mixed the gel in some water, then added the Fruit Fresh and dipped the wool into it--the colors were very bright, and I was surprised at how quickly the wool grabbed the color.

Anyway, it took over 3 days for these to dry, but they were finally dry last night.  So I took my hand needle felter and punched away on this piece, joining them into one piece.  It was slow and tedious, and not very stimulating.  Having an embellishing machine would definitely be better!

I want to do some free motion quilting and other stitching on this piece, I think it will be fun.  If anyone reading this has a felting/embellishing machine, I'd be interested in hearing about them.

So that's my experiment for the week, hope someone will read this and decide to try it for themselves.

And I also finished up my Christmas tree from last week and mailed it to my sister, who received it yesterday.  Linking up with Off-The-Wall Friday today, check out the wonderful projects there!