Winter/Christmas Crazy Quilt Progress

This year, I have several time consuming Christmas projects I plan to complete before December.

One of those projects is my Winter/Christmas Crazy Quilt. I pieced these blocks and mailed them out as part of a Crazy Quilt International Round Robin I participated in from July 2013 to January 2014. Kathy B., Donna A., Barbara W., Kathy S., Melody B. and I each embellished one block.

This month, I added some beads to the snowflakes I am embroidering along the borders. I hope to make a lot of progress to share in February.

-Renee

Christmas mug rugs

Hello, I'm Josie, I blog as Alcea Rosea 31.
 For my first month I chose something easy, that is until I came to the binding. They are not perfect but so much better than my first attempt. Here in the middle of England the weather has been wet and windy, good for staying in and sewing, not so good for setting seeds for the coming year.
I am unable to load a photo at the moment, it says Unable to resolve the server's DNS address.

Starting small and sweet

Hello fellow Elves!

Happy New Year to you!

It's so lovely to be back in the Workshop,

and gosh haven't some of you started off well!

I've begun the year small

some more stitched reindeer

 

 to be part of (hopefully) another large-ish project this year

Though these new reindeer are quite itty as you can see :)

I'm well underway for February's item too!

I am determined to be properly present and correct here this year :)

Before I go I must show my other big-ish finish from last year.

It's been the site of many naps during December :)

 

Thank you so much Narelle for taking on the Head Elf job again!

And thanks for letting me back into the Workshop ;)

Sisbabe

A Christmas UFO Finished

A Christmas finish this month and nearly finished one already for next month too.  This month I completed a table runner out of blocks I have made for block swaps but deemed not good enough to post.  I really like how it turned out.

I even practiced some free-motion quilting on it too.

Until next month

Michell

January Blocks

Good morning lovely Elves ... the fun has begun. Looks like Jeanette and Maria in NC and Cheryll are off to a flying start ... well done and thank you for sharing.

This year I'm concentrating on having some Merry Christmas Garden progress to share each month and hopefully other little makes along the way. Here are the blocks finished this month ... a Present, 2 Circles and a Star ... all for Block 3.

To celebrate our Happy and very productive Elf Workshop, I have been looking back over 2015 and would like to say ... CONGRATULATIONS to Jeanette.  Well done on having an item to share each month through last year and keep an eye on your mailbox for a little something on it's way shortly.

A little house keeping:    Toni, could you email me pinsandwhiskers(at)gmail(dot)com with your email addy so that I can send you an invitation to join the blog ... your comment came through as a no reply.
                                    I have changed the comment section to a separate pop-up ... please let me know if anyone has trouble with it.

Thank you to every Elf for joining us again this year and

Happy Christmas Sewing.

Lets Begin

Yeah... THanKs Narelle for hosting us all again on 2016.
In January I made my GS2 his first Xmas stocking.
This one will hang up in my home each year.

January Ornament

I made my first ornament of 2016 using a free Red Brolly redwork design. I left out the words and added another star instead.

January finishes

I have 2 Xmas finishes. Thought i may have had more but time got away.

Happy Stitching,

Happy New Year 2016

Happy New Year to all elves and may we all have a very successful year in our merry little workshop. Thank you for all you have shared in previous years and I'm sure we are all looking forward to seeing pictures of all the amazing creations to make Christmas 2016 a Happy Handmade Christmas.

It's as simple as following these 3 steps:

1.  Get busy in the sewing room with

     a)   an item which you will use as a decoration in your home at Christmas  OR

     b)  an item to be given as a gift at Christmas  OR

     c)  one large project for the year and post your progress each month.

2.  Post a picture of your finished item (or progress on your large project) between the 25th and end of that month. Please use month 2016 in the label or the month in your title.

3.  No stress allowed ... no problem if you miss a month ... join in again when you can.

PLEASE NOTE:
Can I please ask participants to comment on this post or send an email -  pinsandwhiskers(at)gmail(dot)com - if you wish to take part in 1 Xmas Item A Month for 2016. Our door is always open and new Elves are most welcome to join us in the workshop.  I have already taken note of comments and added the following names as 2016 Elves.  Michell, Jeanette, Sisbabe, Raewyn, Maria in NC, Renee and Myself.

Some Christmas Finishes Throughout The Year

Well I have been very slack this year on this page.  A lot of personal things happening, but now sorted.  After our big move to the Central North Island for the hubbys job at the end of 2014, things did not work out so he up and quit farming and we moved back to Gisborne where we had a couple of houses and now I am a townie.  I grew up on a dairy farm and then meet the hubby who was a sheep and beef farmer, so have always lived on farms (except when I first left school for 20 odd months), so a big change.

Anyway sewing was sort of a back burner, though I did do some for swaps, and I was in a few Christmas swaps during the year so I will showcase them on here now.  I am ready for 2016 and will get back into the 1 Christmas Item a Month again. I already have plans too...... organised!!

Only 8 Sleeps!

Last sewing before Christmas.  This is a 'Michelle Ridgway' pattern I've been working on for a while. The stitchery has been done and waiting for a sewing spree which finally happened last weekend ... just in time to wrap for my Christmas Swap Gift at our Patchwork Group Break-up last Monday.

Sewing Things Tote

and Needle Case

I have also finished a second red Santa face knitted dish cloth but for the life of me my camera won't photograph red! So all my handmade gifts and decorations are done for 2015. It hasn't stopped me knitting though. I'm now using up the blue and green wool in another dish cloth ... a spare for me!

How are your finishing touches going?  I hope you have managed to relieve yourself of some of the last minute end of year stress. My warmest thanks to you all for crafting along in our workshop through the year and I do hope you will be joining me once more for the coming year.
Thank you for your gift of friendship, encouragement and inspiring ideas you have kindly shared.

Please continue to share if you have some extra finishes before Christmas.

Merry Christmas

Some finished gifts

Hello everybody!
I am sorry that I have not been around much this year. I had a rough time and nothing went the way I thought it should. I did manage to finish some Christmas gifts last month and I really would like to stay on next year. I hope it will be a better one and I will actually get things done. Here are my finished gifts.

More Finishes!

I am afraid I am a few days late, but I did manage a few more finishes in November.

I sewed the little topiary I shared a while ago into a tissue cover.

This postcard was created for a swap within the Crazy Quilting International Group.

And I finished the crazy quilted stocking I was working on for my son. (He did not want his name on it because he wants to pass it on to his own family some day.)

This tote bag was almost finished in November. I added the last stitches to it today. (It was made following this tutorial.)

I really want to thank Narelle for offering the opportunity to participate with this blog and for the motivation to create a Christmas item a month. I still have a few projects to finish up, but it is nice to have several already completed. Thank you!

November's Finish

November is a big item month.

My 2015 longer-term item is finished

and before Christmas

oh my :)

Okay so I'm a day late posting about it.

Quibble, quibble, lol

You've seen stitched reindeer

and a paling fence that took way longer than expected

so are you ready to see 

where they are now?

I hope so.

And I hope you won't be disappointed!

My 

craZy 8 cHristMas quiLt

It's simple piecing,

 and 

the quilting (done by me) 

is simple too

Random straight lines through the blocks

then some curved lines over the seams

(just for insurance ;) )  

I am so pleased it has been finished this year :)

Thank you so much Narelle for this fantastic workshop

and also thanks to all the other friendly elves

whose encouragement and support

means so many of our

short AND long-term Chrismassy goals can be achieved :)

May your Christmas to-do-list be full of bright and bold ticks :)
  Sisbabe

Just Made It

before the end of November...
I only had time for a small item before I went on holidays...
A handy little xmas bag for "things"... Ho Ho Ho

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