Dough Boy

Happy New Year!  I hit the ground running with ornaments in January and I'm making good progress.  I wanted to do some that I hadn't done or, in some cases, hadn't seen anyone else do, either.  Dough Boy was first in the list in the latter category.

I'm also trying some different techniques with how I put ornaments together.  When I made Woody, I experimented with stitching and stuffing the hands and boots before attaching them to the body.  Here's a pic to refresh your memory:

WHAT ... A ... PAIN!

I like the look of the outcome, but it was time-consuming and tedious trying to stitch through stuffing.  

When I started Dough Boy, I knew I wanted the legs to be separate from the apron.  In other words, I didn't want to stitch apron front to leg fronts, apron back to leg backs, and then put it all front-to-back and stitch all the way around.  The reason is because you wind up with this effect:

See how the skirt creeps down on the legs and then back up between them instead of having a nice, smooth, continuous curve?  Yeah . . . don't want that.  (Side note:  ever notice that Sofia looks like she's on steroids or something?)

I knew I wanted to have the legs inserted into the apron, but I didn't want to stitch through pre-stuffed legs.  What's a girl to do?  Leave the legs open at the bottom and insert them UNstuffed!  Let's give it a try, shall we??

I stitched the sides of the pants and across the top.  Then I stuck them between the two apron pieces and stitched the apron together.  Left the black stitching along the bottom of the shoes.  Then I stuffed the pants and feet and THEN stitched the shoes shut.  Worked like a charm!  If it worked for the legs, it'll surely work for the hat -- right?

How come it only took me about 5 years to figure this out???

And here's the finished product:

I added some icing to the cake just to make it more fancy and I added some stitching to the apron to make it less boring.  The pattern calls for his pants and shirt to be one piece, but I thought he was a bit old for a onesie, so I dressed him in separates.  He's really cute and colorful and I can't wait to hang him up.

Next up technique-wise is how to handle heads.  I hate how the head sometimes creeps down and creates a neck like this one did.  I changed how I did that on the next ornament and it looks great!  I'm going to try to post every other Sunday, so you'll only have to wait two weeks to see my next one.  I hope you're already busy stitching your 2015 collection!

Ornaments From Other Bloggers

Traffic on the blog really picked up this year.  I mean, we're hardly viral . . . but we've grown to a nice small community of people who really enjoy making these ornaments.  Nothing makes me more excited than to check the blog email address and find a message from someone new waiting for me.  Most of the time, the message says something along the lines of, "My family had Carolyn DeAngelis ornaments on our tree when I was a child and they were made by my mother/grandmother/aunt.  Now I'd like to make them for my own children."  Some of you were just randomly searching for felt ornaments and stumbled here.  And not once, but TWICE, I heard from ladies who had lots of patterns and ornaments and lost them all in house fires.  I can't tell you how happy I was to inform them that I'd share my patterns with them.

I really love it when people make the ornaments and then send me photos.  I love seeing ones that I haven't made before.  I really love seeing the different twist people put on them.  Every ornament looks completely different depending on who stitches it.  The tiniest changes can make the biggest difference!  I've been hoarding all the pictures so I could do one big "ornaments from other people" post and here it is!

These ornaments are from Janet and her story is one of my favorites.  She first wrote to me back in 2012, which seems hard to believe.  She and a group of friends have been stitching ornaments -- many of them Carolyn DeAngelis patterns -- for their church bazaar for about 40 years!  These are some they stitched this year, including the Fisher Price Little People I designed.

ANGELICA

ANGELEEN

CHRIS ANGEL II

FISHER PRICE LITTLE PEOPLE

AFRICAN RUBBER NECK

MOM HOPPER

Jennifer just contacted me in December.  Her mom used to make the ornaments and they had dozens of them on their tree growing up.  Now Jennifer & her sister make them for their own children.  She still has all her mother's patterns and we're comparing lists to see if there are ones we can share.  In addition to making ornaments, her mother used Carolyn's patterns to make these fantastic stockings.  Aren't they beautiful?

LEO & CHRISTMAS TRAIN EXPRESS

GOLDILOCKS, B.B. BEAR, CHERRY BEAR, TIDBIT, POPCORN

GREEN CHRISTMAS & SWEET DREAMS

POPPIN, BEARABLE BEAR, GREEN CHRISTMAS

I always love to see Kathy's ornaments because her stitching it absolutely perfect!  And she's fast, too!  She always does a bunch and her 2014 ornaments were beautiful.

STAR BRIGHT, ANGEL ANDY, HERALD

CLAUDETTE, YULE MOUSE, CLAUDE

ROQUEFORT, CHEESY CLAUS, MISSUS MOUSE

SNOW YOUTH & MISS FLUFF

 Katy initially emailed me about a year ago.  She had a bunch of her mother's patterns and was looking for more.  Katy's mother literally made HUNDREDS of ornaments over the years for her five children.  Here's just a sampling of what she still has.  Get ready to drool!

Like lots of us, Katy's mom had fun personalizing ornaments as the kids got older.  This "drummer dude," hockey player, and skier were for Katy's brother.

Katy and her sisters hiked a mountain once and their mom made these hiker girl ornaments for them.

 These are wedding party ornaments done for Katy's sister and her brother.  What a fantastic keepsake!

These ornaments were made for Katy's sister to commemorate when she dressed as Xena: Warrior Princess for Halloween . . . and later for when she became a park ranger.

Sarah just sent me this picture today of four ornaments she made with the Katrina pattern.  You can't go wrong with this pattern.  It turns out great every time!  I love the different color combinations and I particularly like the decorative trim Sarah used on the coats and bonnets.

And last, but not least, my pal, Ouida, stitched up a bunch of ornaments this year.  You can thank Ouida for this blog.  If she'd never made me an ornament and never shared her mother's patterns with me, none of us would be reading this right now!

I'm not sure which pattern this is . . . . but it's cute nonetheless!

TIN LIZZY

I'm not sure about this one, either.  This looks like a hybrid of Hiccups and Koko . . . unless Ouida has a pattern that I don't!

HOLY  MACKEREL

TOUCHDOWN TOMMY

These are wedding couples Ouida made for both her son and daughter, who were both married recently.  When you customize these to look like the wedding party, there's no better gift!

And there you have it!  Possibly the longest post in the history of this blog.  I hope you enjoyed seeing everyone's work as much as I did.  Remember . . . . if you make an ornament, SEND ME THE PHOTO!!

Merry Christmas!

Well, nothing like sliding in on Christmas Eve with one last post!  Here's this year's batch of ornaments -- minus the hunter, which wasn't yet finished when I needed to take this photo prior to my Thanksgiving distribution to my sister's family.

For awhile now, I've been wanting a tree covered with felt ornaments just like Clif's:

At our old house, we had a 12-foot tree.  In the new house, the ceilings weren't tall enough, so we had to get a smaller one.  The 12-foot one had been completely covered with ornaments, so I knew there was no way to get them all on a smaller tree.    What's a girl to do?

GET TWO TREES!

We got a 9-foot tree for the dining room and a 7-foot tree for the kitchen.  Granted, I don't have nearly as many ornaments as Clif does.  (Maybe I need to spend a year just making ornaments for myself and forget about everyone else -- don'tcha think??)  I filled in with some candy canes and I think it looks pretty good.  And there's room for plenty more!

I hope you're all enjoying your ornaments this year.  I've had some fantastic emails lately from readers who have fond memories of Carolyn DeAngelis ornaments from their childhood.  Nothing makes me happier than when someone says, "Do you have ANY idea of where I can get the patterns?" and I can say, "YES, I DO!"  Many of you have shared some wonderful pictures and I plan to sit down in January and share those with you on the blog.  Thanks to all of you who read, email, stitch, and share.  I started this blog to show Ouida and Clif the ornaments I was making and there are now dozens of you checking in.  How fun!

Have a wonderful Christmas and a happy and blessed 2015!

AMY

Woody

I guess this should be titled "A Twist On Woody."  It was time for Luke's ornament -- my BFF's son.  He's the owner of the Pittsburgh Steeler football player and drum set ornaments, among others.  It was hard to decide what to stitch him for this year.  He started high school and is in the marching band, so I thought about tweaking the Fyfield pattern to dress him like our high school's band uniforms.  Since I'd just given him a drummer ornament last year, though, that seemed a bit repetitive.  I thought about designing a knight since that's our high school's mascot, but I'm not gonna lie -- I was too lazy.  (Incidentally, that knight is on the to-do list every year and never makes the cut.  Since Mariah starts high school next fall, I might have to get it in gear.)

We were actually having a family discussion about Luke's ornament at dinner one night and Scott came up with the idea for a hunter.  I started wondering about camo felt and did some searching online and found that Hobby Lobby carries it.  We don't have Hobby Lobby anywhere around here, so I had to wait until we made a shopping trip to Pittsburgh to get it.  The scale of the print was a little larger than I would've liked, but beggars can't be choosers.  I just had to strategically place the pattern pieces where the print was on the smaller side.  I also didn't love that the felt was only printed on the front and it had a white core.  What's a girl to do?

Again -- I'm no artist.  I knew I'd have to find an image to work into a pattern.  I asked Kelly, Luke's older sister, what he wore when he went hunting.  She said he wore an orange safety vest and an orange knit hat.  My mind immediately pictured Clif's version of Woody:

Problem solved!  Dress him in camo, give him a gun instead of an axe, and we're good to go!

Admittedly, that's not the greatest gun ever.  Have I mentioned that I CAN'T DRAW???  I was concerned about the white core on the felt showing on the sides and it does, but it's not anything that detracts from the overall look of the ornament.  I think Luke will really like him!

And this is a great visual for how ornaments made from the same pattern can look so completely different.  There are so many variables:  colors, stitching style, etc.  It's one of the things I love most about seeing other people's ornament pictures.  So make sure to send me YOURS!  I'll be posting soon with lots of photos made by others.  You'll love them!

Zombie Zoey

I've made ornaments each year for my nephews for a long time.  Because Mariah just joined our family last year, I feel I'm a bit behind with her ornament collection!  I made two for her and will be frantically stitching to try and complete a third before Christmas.  (We'll see how that works out!)

When I bought the clip-art for the snorkeling ornament, I noticed that JW Illustrations also had a cute clip-art package called Zombie Kids.  Like most teens, Mariah is caught up in the zombie craze.  I thought it would be fun to make an ornament to commemorate this fascination.  Here's Zombie Zoey:

I did something different method-wise on this one that I really wound up liking.  Skirts and legs are always problematic.  I usually stitch each leg to the skirt front, and stitch legs to the skirt back.  Then I stitch the front and back together as one piece.  When you do that, you sometimes wind up with a little something weird happening . . . . like this:

See how the skirt creeps down on the legs and up between the legs?  Not a fan.  I knew with the jagged bottom of Zoey's skirt, I'd wind up with all kinds of distortion if I tried to do it the normal way.  Instead, I stitched each leg front to back and stuffed them, leaving the top 1/4" or so unstuffed.  Then, I put the body front to back and as I was stitching around the bottom of the skirt, I inserted the completed legs.  (Does that make sense?)  It turned out perfect!  Incidentally, I did the ponytails the same way.

For the ornament I'm working on now, I'm trying that method with the hands and legs.  I'm anxious to see how it turns out.  He's an adaption of an existing Carolyn DeAngelis pattern and I can't for you to seem him later this week!

DISCLAIMERS:

In case anyone happens by and thinks I've stolen someone else's work or thinks I'm profiting from it:

• I purchased the clip-art.  I did not do a "right click/save as."
• I am not selling a pattern made from this clip-art.  I'm not even giving away a pattern made from this clip-art.  
• I am not selling ornaments made from this clip-art.  

Snorkeling Mariah

As I told you in the Pacos post, our family took a vacation to Mexico in August.  One of the highlights was snorkeling.  This was Mariah's first beach vacation and first time snorkeling.  She LOVED it!

I made the Pacos and donkey set for our family tree, but I wanted to make Mariah her own ornament from the trip.  In my search for some suitable images to use, I stumbled upon the website for JW Illustrations.  She has very affordable clip-art packages that lend themselves very well to our purposes.  I purchased several different packages from her, including one that included images of girls snorkeling.  That led to this little cutie, which I named Snorkeling Mariah.  Isn't she great?  We're decorating the tree tomorrow and I can't wait to see her on there!

DISCLAIMERS:

In case anyone happens by and thinks I've stolen someone else's work or thinks I'm profiting from it:

• I purchased the clip-art.  I did not do a "right click/save as."
• I am not selling a pattern made from this clip-art.  I'm not even giving away a pattern made from this clip-art.  
• I am not selling ornaments made from this clip-art.  

Pacos and Donkey

This summer, our family took a trip to Mexico.  We all had a great time swimming, sunning, snorkeling, and just generally being lazy.  We also really enjoyed the local cuisine.  The maitre d' at one restaurant really left a lasting impression on all of us.  He was an absolute riot and kept us laughing through our whole meal.  His name was Roberto Carlos, but Mariah has insisted on calling him Robert Carl, which she says is his American name.

Here we are taking the typical tourist pic.  And yes, I probably COULD have found a less flattering picture of myself!

And here is Mariah with her new best friend, Robert  Carlos:

I wanted to make an ornament to commemorate our trip and it wasn't a hard decision. Pacos!  I thought about designing a girlfriend for him, but I've already done an international pair this year and, I'm not gonna lie, I did think about the time involved with everything else going on in our lives.  I remembered my Eskimo and husky dog and decided to give Pacos a burro instead of a woman.  (Something tells me he does not share my enthusiasm for this idea!)

They turned out great and we'll think of wonderful memories from our first vacation as a family of four every time we look at them!