{Holiday Crafting} My Christmas Stocking!!

This week I have put the final touches on our Christmas decor, with the very last piece being My Very Own Christmas Stocking. Finally! 

In my last post, I showed you the Christmas Stocking I made and monogrammed for Chris. I made a matching stocking for myself, and am totally in love with it!
 

The only difference between the two stockings, aside from the obviously different toes, is that while making Chris's stocking, I didn't use bias strips to make the piping, and what a mistake that was! See Chris's stocking below, I wasn't overly impressed with how the toe came out.

I learned my lesson and used bias strips to make the piping for my stocking, and I am thankful because it would have been miserable to pipe otherwise.

Don't you love the pair? Can someone please pay me to sit home and make Christmas stockings all day??

HOLLER!

{Holiday Crafting} Monogrammed Christmas Stocking!

I am so excited to show you this project! 

If you've been following me for a while, you may have seen this Quilted Christmas Stocking that I made last Christmas. It was my first Christmas stocking, and when I pulled  it out of the Christmas bins this year, I really wasn't too fond of it. 

I actually don't think that I like the look of quilted things for my home, aside from Quilts of course.

Does anyone else feel that way? I think I'd rather have certain items in my home have a more formal look than quilted goods offer. 

Anyway, that meant that  I had to find a new Christmas Stocking and possibly tree skirt pattern this year. I saw this great pattern at the Sewing Shop and thought that I['d give it a go. Actually, I am teaching a few classes on this pattern.

I have been holding onto this Anna Maria Horner velveteen fabric for quite a while now, as I think that it SCREAMS Christmas to me, without being too theme-y. Look how great it looks paired with a dark green cotton sateen (I think) fabric that I decided to use as piping. 

You can see in the pattern above that there are two stocking options. Given that I want to use the same fabric for each stocking, with the same piping too, I decided that I would make the Elf Style stocking for me, and the other stocking for my Husband ("C"hris).

Ok so I knew that I would use Anna Maria's velveteen fabric as the base fabric, and I knew that I would use the gorgeous sateen fabric, but I thought that monogramming our initials onto the stocking would be perfecccctt. I am new to embroidery, so I did a few practice runs, naturally.

I definitely liked the second "C" better than the first. It was also SUPER easy and quick to make. Then I had to play  around with the scale and placement of the letter on the stocking. I wasn't sure if I wanted it big or small, in the center or near the top, or what. 

I am not sure how real embroiderers would go about making this project, but this is the only way that I could think of. 

I was also trying out with different thread colors. I was using Pearle Cotton in size 5. It has a gorgeous sheen which is perfect for this formal yet informal stocking. I ended up using the two green combo at the bottom. I wasn't sure that I wanted to introduce a new color to the mix.

Here are some progress pics:

I think that the C turned out pretty well!!
 

Then I made some piping -- I do think that I need to use bias strips to make the piping next time, be cause I am going around curves which were very tough.

 Here is the finished stocking!! Don't you love it? Now I have to make one for myself too...

All in all, this project was really really very easy. The embroidery was super simple and the stocking pattern was easy peasy. I do think that I changed the pattern to eliminate the cuff and other embellishments that I just don't think are my style.

HOLLER!

Harvest Table Runner

I know that my love for Anna Maria Horner is very apparent from all of my blog posts and what not. But that love has deepened ever since I got a hold of her new cotton velveteen collection. This fabric is so luxurious! I knew that it was absolutely PERFECT for this project that I have been thinking of working on for a while now.

You can see the gorgeous sheen on this fabric. ooo lala.

I was playing around with the width. See, I wanted a wide and super-long table runner. This fabric is 54 inch wide fabric like most home decor weight fabric, about 10 inches wider than the standard quilting cotton. I only bought 1 yard (at $20/yard, eeeeek I know). So that meant that I had 36x54 fabric. Soooo given that I wanted this table runner to fit our table with both leaves in (that would make the table 96 inches long) I knew that I need to cut up the fabric into 3 pieces. So that left me with 3 18x36 inch strips.

 

Then I had to piece some backing for the runner. I just used some white and off-white fabric with a faint flower print on it. Very subtle. I started thinking that maybe this table runner was TOO long.... wouldn't even fit in our upstairs hallway! I also pieced a middle layer. At first I thought about using batting for the middle layer, but then I had that heat resistant fabric that you would typically use for potholders and ironing boards... so I used that.

Then I cut the ends to come to a point. I learned that the general rule to making the point look proportionate is dividing the width by 2. Therefore, 18/2 = 9 inches.

Then I piled all three layers together and started stitching. Notice that the velveteen and the backing were sewn right sides together so I can turn the table runner inside out.

After I sewed it all together, flipped it inside-out, and ironed it flat, it still didn't look "finished". I had the idea that maybe if I topstitched around the outside that might give it a more professional look. I used my 1/4 inch foot and topstitched around the entire outside. I am very happy with how it turned out!

Now, my favorite part. Time for some glamor shots.

Are you loving it as much as I am?

Another project checked off the bucket list!!! Wooohooo! Check out my flickr account and the sidebar on my blog for all of my finished projects. Enjoy!


Holler!