Flamingo

Caleb loves all things tropical.  Pineapples, flamingos, watermelon, hula girls . . . . and the tackier, the better.  His classroom decor is even tropical-themed this year.  I thought he definitely needed a festive flamingo on his tree, so I went in search of a pattern and found this one.  It turned out great and Caleb loved it.  

You'll notice that the top wing is a little sparkly.  A couple felt pattern designers I follow are starting to use this new glitter felt that's on the market.  I have glitter felt from Joann, but it's like regular felt with some glitter sprinkled on it.  This is felt backed and has a very thorough coating of fine glitter on the front.  It's beautiful  It's stiffer than regular felt and a little more challenging to get a needle through, but not impossible.  I would never do an entire ornament from it.  It would take forever and would be too stiff, not to mention the expense!  But it adds a really nice bit of sparkle. 

It's heinously expensive and not for the casual crafter.  I asked for a sample pack for my birthday and got the 6"x 9" sheets.  That should keep me in business for a while.  I got it from an Etsy shop called Benzie because that's the shop recommended by the designers I follow.  Click here if you're interested.  

Disclaimer:  I don't get any kickbacks for providing links to either the pattern or the glitter felt.  I'm just sharing resources with you for things I've purchased and liked.  

    

Downeast Thunder Farm Birds

On Pinterest, I found a wonderful site called Downeast Thunder Farms.  She offers beautiful patterns of all your favorite birds and wildlife and they are TOTALLY FREE!!! They are nicely done with color photos and you can just print them right out.  Cool, right??  My husband loves the birdfeeder outside his office window, so I wanted to make him some birds.  They were pretty quick and I love the detailed stitching you can add.  Get yourself right over to that site and download some patterns!  I'm placing the direct link to the specific patterns under each picture.  

Cardinal 

Redheaded Woodpecker

Boreal Chickadee

Ornaments from Others

I love, love, LOVE when blog readers get the patterns, make ornaments, and then send me pictures of them!  In the past couple of weeks, there have been about 6 people who have contacted me about patterns.  I can't WAIT to see what they do with them.  Sometimes, they tell me they have Carolyn DeAngelis ornaments from their childhood.  If YOU do . . . please remember to take pictures of them when you decorate your tree this year!

Ouida sent me pictures of two of her latest.  This is Goldilocks and B.B. Bear.

Kathy has been stitching like crazy this year and her ornaments are bee-yoo-tee-ful!!!  Here's her African Rubber Neck.

The mice are some of my favorites.  Here's Claude.

This is Claudette.

 Meet Missus Mouse!

Kathy and I realized that we stitched our Percivals at exactly the same time!

Don't forget to send me pictures of YOUR finished ornaments!!  It's always fun to see the spin each individual stitcher puts on a pattern.  Sometimes I don't even find the paper pattern appealing and then I see someone else's completed piece and I LOVE it and want to stitch it myself.  Clif about killed me when he first sent me pictures of all his ornaments.  I immediately fell in love with several of his and made them shortly thereafter.  He made my ornament to-do list muuuuch longer!

Percival

I don't want to over-share personal information when you're really here to read about felt ornaments!  Suffice it to say that my husband and I are in the process of adopting a 12 year-old girl from foster care and she's a big fan of penguins.  I have ridiculously high reasonable expectations about her level of excitement for all things Christmas -- particularly ornaments.  It seemed obvious to a) start her a collection of felt ornaments and b) make her first one a penguin.  Percival it is!

Definitely not the most exciting of the Carolyn DeAngelis patterns, but still pretty darn cute!  I think Mariah will like him . . . . especially the earmuffs, done in her favorite shade of turquoise.

New Ornament Friends

I am so very excited that not one, but FOUR, Carolyn DeAngelis fans have found this blog and contacted me in the past month!  I wonder what the explanation for THAT happy coincidence is???  Whatever the reason, I'm so excited that our little community has expanded . . . okay, TRIPLED!

Kathy, a new friend who is, ironically, located not all that far from me has some CDA ornaments that her aunt made for her family when she was young.  She would like to start making them herself, so she did a little searching and found the blog.  She was gracious enough to share photos of her aunt's ornaments and I thank her for allowing me to share them here so we can all enjoy them!

Al Pine

Angelica

Carol Singer

Anyone know the name of this one?  I don't have him in my pattern collection!

Claude

Elf Himself the XII

Gogassett

Hop A Bit

Karl Singer

Lollipop Linda

Mom Hopper

Octavius

Sandy

Smart Cookie

Snow Bird

Snug Bug

Sunbonnet Sally

Tootsie

 Traffic Stopper

Dawdling Duck

Another one for me! When I saw Clif's version of this ornament, I thought it was so cute. I knew I wanted to make it for myself. I thought it would take a long time because it seemed like it had a lot of pieces with the little suitcase and all. It really wasn't that bad, though. I didn't make any changes other than choosing my own colors.

Eagle

We have a young friend who began attending Ashland University here in Ohio this fall. Ashland's mascot is an eagle and their colors are purple and gold. I knew right away that I wanted to make him the eagle ornament for Christmas, but my creativity stopped there. On a campus visit, I spied a banner with an eagle whose body was purple. A-HA! I usually don't think up the ideas on my own, but I'm a masterful copier! I used Print Shop to make a varsity "A" to put on his chest. He turned out fantastic and I have no doubt that Caleb will be very happy at Christmas.



And now you know my big photography secret. I lay my ornaments on a yellow mailing envelope to take their pictures. I'm too lazy to crop the flap off of this one. And if you look at Star's picture, you can see the return address in the corner. Sorry to blow my cover!

Blessed Event

I made this one for Nurse Naomi since she works in labor & delivery. I made a few changes. For starters, that bundle needed a baby! Secondly, I made felt legs and then stuffed them with pipe cleaners. I also stuffed the beak with a pipe cleaner. I took a long one, bent it in half, and shoved it in there. I figured it would give the beak more stability for toting that heavy baby! I also made the wings dimensional. I thought this one really turned out cute. This'll be my new standard baby gift!

Some of Ouida's Ornaments

Ouida sent me pictures of only some of her felt ornaments. These are ones she did just recently.

The 3 Little Pigs:

She used a pipecleaner for the broom handle and a real ribbon for the bow tie on the pig on the left. The middle pig has a felt hoe handle that's stuffed with a pipe cleaner. The pig on the right has real buttons on his vest and a pompom on his hat. She stitched all the tails and stuffed them with pipe cleaners so they'd be 3D. Ouida uses real pipecleaners made for pipes, and not craft store pipecleaners. The real ones aren't as fuzzy and the wire is stiffer. Gotta get some of those!



Bearry Special Christmas:

Again, this one has a real ribbon bow at the neck.

Mother Goose:

Those look like pipecleaner legs to me . . . . but knowing Ouida, they're probably stitched from felt and stuffed with a pipecleaner!