Sewing/Crafts
Handmade Christmas: Advent Calendar
I’ve always loved the idea of having an Advent Calendar with an activity to do each day of December up to Christmas, but I’d never found just the right one. Early in November this year, I saw and fell for this one on the Sew Mama Sew Blog: Advent Calendar. I modified the calendar slightly (I really am planning to practice free-motion machine quilting one of these days). Overall, though, I followed the instructions there, and the result is exactly what I was hoping for.
It actually took me more time to come up with the activities than it did to sew up the calendar. I really wanted activities that were centered around spending time as a family and giving to others.
Here’s my list of activities–feel free to use any or all of the ideas! In fact, I’d love to hear what you think!
1. Make button wreath ornaments.
2. Color pictures for troops overseas.
3. Visit a relative (or a friend) for lunch. (We’re driving out to visit our oldest daughter at college.)
4. Go see a family Christmas theatre production. (Our local playhouse is doing A Christmas Wizard of Oz.)
5. Walk in (or you could just watch) the city Christmas parade.
6. Buy gifts for a needy family. (We choose one from the Angel Tree at our church, but there are many organizations that you can give through.)
7. Have a family game night. (Board games and popcorn! Our favorite family games are Mexican Train and Speed Scrabble.)
8. Buy canned goods and deliver to a local food pantry. (You might want to call ahead and ask what they are specifically in need of. Our church’s pantry actually told me that need meat and bread more than canned goods right now.)
9. Watch Frosty the Snowman (or any other classic animated movie).
10. Make jar mixes for our Christmas dinner guests. (Jar mixes are nice gifts to have on hand for expected or unexpected Christmas guests. They’re fun and easy for kids to put together, too.)
11. Attend company (or ministry or other group) Christmas party.
12. Visit a living nativity. (We have a local church that does a beautiful one each year.)
13. Make Christmas card ornaments.
14. Make cards for Nana and Papa.
15. Make cards for MawMaw.
16. Bake cookies.
17. Take cookies to the local firestation. (We’re actually going to invite some other local homeschool families to join us in this one.)
18. Go out for dinner. (Enjoy a special night out at your family’s favorite restaurant. I’m not sure whether it’ll be Italian or Mexican for us.)
19. Go Christmas shopping for siblings. (We give each of our children a budget and let them shop for each other.)
20. Watch A Christmas Story (or another live-action Christmas movie).
21. Drive around to see Christmas lights. (You could drive around your neighborhood or go see a big light presentation somewhere close by.)
22. Make playdough and play with Christmas cookie cutters. (This is one of my kids’ favorite activities, and we don’t do it often enough. We like to make Kool-aid playdough. I thought this one would be a great calming activity for just before Christmas when things can get a little overwhelming.)
23. Visit and take pictures with Santa Claus.
24. Make a birthday cake for Jesus. (This a traditional family activity of ours that helps us to put the focus back on what the Christmas season is really about. We even gather around the table, light candles and sing Happy Birthday to Jesus.)
I have a two back-up ideas on hand in case something doesn’t work out, too: string popcorn to hang outside for the birds and plant an indoor herb garden. My husband also suggested that next year we see if we can ring the bell for the Salvation Army one day.
Here’s our calendar hung on the wall and ready for Tuesday:
The kids are really excited about finding out what each activity is going to be. (We’re keeping them a secret until they open the envelopes each morning.) I’m really excited about getting started, too!
Handmade Christmas: Personalized Perpetual Calendars
I think these calendars are quite possibly the coolest thing that I’ve ever made! I have to thank Rashida from i heart linen for the amazing idea. You can find Rashida’s original calendar here: Prairie Girl, Calendar Girl. When I first saw the calendar, the idea of putting fabric photos in it popped in my head, and I couldn’t wait to run to Joanns to get all the supplies. I am so happy with how these turned out, and I hope that the recipients love them! I emailed Rashida and found out that she has instructions for how to make these in her new book, I Love Patchwork: 25 Irrestible Zakka Projects to Sew, which is due out in just a few weeks and available for preorder right now. (I have it on my Christmas list–I can’t wait to see what other great ideas she has in there!)
I altered mine a bit from the original by putting a magnet strip on the back of each one so that they can be hung up on the refrigerator:
The days are made from fabric-covered buttons and the months are made from tiny popsicle sticks. Both mount with velcro.
Messenger Bag Tutorial
I really like sewing new bags for my sister, nieces and daughters every Christmas, and I think they really like receiving them. (I heard that my oldest niece loves to tell her friends when they ask about her bags that they’re one of a kind!) Handmade bags for the girls have sort of become my annual tradition. This year, I’ve been sewing messenger bags for everyone and thought I’d share my pattern with you. I hope that you’ll enjoy creating with it for yourself and your loved ones.
The tutorial is for the laptop-size messenger bag, but there are suggestions at the end for how to alter the size to your own specifications.
You can find the pattern and instructions here: Messenger Bag.
I’d love to hear from you and see pictures if you make one, and I’m always happy to answer questions. Just leave me a comment, and I’ll do my best to get back with you as soon as I can!
Don’t miss my Art-On-The-Go Kit Tutorial which makes a great stocking stuffer and, of course, my Christmas Stocking Tutorial, too! I hope they help to get you on your way to your own Handmade Holiday traditions!
Bigger Sizes of the Little One Layette are Coming!
I know, it sounds a little strange to have a layette pattern in toddler sizes, but so many mamas asked for it that I just had to oblige! As a mama of a little one who’s in size 3T, I’m thrilled with it already. The test version went out to my amazing team of testers this morning. If all goes well, it should be ready within the next few weeks. The pattern will fit sizes 18 months to 5T. Here’s a sneak peek at Jamie wearing the Jamie Jumper and the laptee and pants set.
Handmade Christmas Gifts – Preschool Memory Games
I used the Memory Game Tutorial at Kindershop Online to make these Memory Games for almost three-year-old Jamie and Ray’s nephew who is the same age. I know that they’ll get a lot of use!
Both sets:
The fronts (both sets are almost exactly the same):
All packed up in their drawstring bags and ready for giving:
A PJ Swap and Dyed Tees for Baby
October’s swap on my favorite online sewing board was for PJs. We really need winter PJs around here, and I thought it would be a great way to get me moving on them! My swap partner has a son and a daughter who are six and thirteen, so I sewed for both of them, and she sewed for Jamie and Samantha. (Samantha was so excited to get something handmade in the mail!)
Here are the jammies that we received:
The kids love them, and they fit so well!
Here are the jammies that I sent to my partner in Hawaii:
Isn’t that view gorgeous?
I also want to show off these little t-shirts that I dyed for Baby Charlie. It is so hard to find solid colored tees for little ones, and we really like them for the newborn stage with wool longies over our cloth diapers (hmmm . . . I feel like I’ve said that before). I found these side-snap t-shirts on clearance at our local Ross:
A couple of evenings and several packs of Dylon later, and they look like this:
I love the vibrant colors!
And one last picture of Samantha and Jamie in their new jammies because it’s so sweet!
Rag Quilt for Baby Charlie
We have plenty of receiving blankets left from when Jamie was tiny, but every baby needs special things made just for him, right? I saw this tutorial: How to Make a Ragged Squares Quilt at Crazy Mom Quilts a few days ago and thought it would make a perfect baby boy quilt! I picked out some really cute Debbie Mumm prints at Joanns and got started. Because of the way the quilt is sewn, it goes together really fast! I purposely put all of the ragged squares on slightly crooked to give it an even more childlike look, and I trimmed the edges of the rag squares to make them fray a little better. I probably could have done a better job of planning out the border, but when it’s wrapped around a little one, maybe no one will notice that it doesn’t line up perfectly. I really like the fun, casual look of the end result. I think I might have to do another one of these!
Fun at Pirate Days!
We visited the annual Pirate Days celebration here in the town where we live yesterday and had a great time. We enjoyed Pancakes with Pirates which was put on by our local church to raise money for the local food pantry. The kids had a blast in the kids’ section which was full of mazes, jumpers and slides. We even watched a sword fight!
I thought it would be fun to sew up pirate-y shirts for the kids to wear–not really costumes, rather something that they could wear to the festival and then wear again and again. I did decide at the last minute to make a skirt for Samantha instead. I figured that if she just wore it this one time, I could recycle it into something else later.
The pictures aren’t great because my good camera is still broken, but I did get this one up-close picture of the fabrics and the embroidery on Sean’s shirt.
Ready to hang out with the pirates for the day! (The younger boys’ shirts are sewn from my Patrick Curved Raglan pattern. Samantha’s skirt I just made up as I went along. Sean’s shirt is just a simple long-sleeve t-shirt that I modified by adding the 2/3 strip of pirate fabric to the front and the pirate ship embroidery.)
Just some random shots of the fun:
I was most excited about that last shirt, the one that I made for my 16-year-old. It’s hard to make something that a 16-year-old boy is willing to wear in public! Sean had a few friends over the night before, and they were checking it out. One said, “Your mom made this?! I would wear this!” I think that’s the biggest compliment I’ve gotten in a while!
Knitting for Baby with Some Matching Sewing, Too!
I am so excited that I’ve learned to knit! I taught myself with the help of some of the wonderful ladies at DiaperSewingDivas.net and the awesome videos at KnittingHelp.com. I really like knitted wool longies with matching tops for the newborn to 6 months or so stage. All of the longies that I’ve done so far were knit using the Picky Pants pattern. Here’s what I’ve finished so far:
These newborn-size longies were knit with Fisherman’s Wool that was dyed by an online friend. I sewed the coordinating tops using my own Little One Layette lap-tee pattern.
I knit this pair of small longies using Honey Organic Merino dyed by Julie of Selah in her Mint Chocolate Zoo colorway. The lap-tee was made using my LOL pattern, and I drafted the snap-shoulder tee in a similar fashion. For the hat, I used the Welcome to the World Newborn hat pattern.
My third pair of longies was knit using o-wool that was custom-dyed by Stephanie of Morning Glory to match the goldfish print from Kumquat. The shirts and hat were done using the same patterns as above.
I also knitted two Sheepy Sacks to use for the newborn stage. The first one was knit using BFL from Earth Yarn in the Pat the Bunny colorway. The second one was knit using organic merino that was dyed for us by another online friend.
Cloth Diaper Stash for Baby Caleb
A local friend has been using Jamie’s stash of newborn diapers, but her little guy is quickly outgrowing the newborn diapers. I offered to sew up a stash of small fitteds and medium AI2s for them. We chose gender neutral prints since this is their first baby. This way, they’ll be able to use them over (and over) again.
There are 24 fitteds altogether. I used the size small Fattycakes pattern for these. They’re made with two layers of cotton knit and an inner layer of cotton velour with snap-in trifold soakers of two layers of cotton velour. There are two of each print, but they’re stacked on top of each other for the pictures:
We also decided to make a dozen medium AI2s. This way, she’ll be able to unsnap the soakers and use the shells as covers over the small fitteds until baby is big enough to be ready for the medium diapers. These are made using the medium Fattycakes pattern. Each has an outer polyester PUL layer and an inner layer of microfleece. The snap-in soakers are also trifolds with two layers of cotton velour and one layer of cotton interlock.
Jamie’s newborn stash has been used by four different babies now. That’s pretty amazing considering that I really had no idea what I was doing when I sewed those diapers. I love that we’ve been able to encourage other mamas to try cloth just by passing on our outgrown diapers. The first two moms who used our old diapers even decided to sew their own!
