Doczee

Brayden, our latest acquisition, had a dachshund when he was little.  He was determined to get an ornament this year, so I quickly threw this one together right at Thanksgiving.  I added the brown patches to make him look more realistic.  He was quick and easy . . . and well received!  

Panda

If you've been reading this blog for a while, you know I make each of my nephews an ornament each year.  My oldest nephew is graduating high school in May, so that means I'll be making another blasted Graduate ornament this year.  Another one that turns out great, but makes me hate it through the entire stitching process!  I was sort of stumped as to what ornament I'd make for him this past Christmas.

Then I recalled his love of pandas when he was little.  So deep was his love that he once wanted to be a panda vet when he grew up.  Not just an ordinary, run-of-the-mill vet -- a PANDA vet!  This fact is at the root of the great panda/pop-tart incident.  My brother-in-law does not allow food in his car.  Ever.  When Alex was in grade school, he fooled around one morning and didn't get breakfast before it was time to leave for school.  He begged to eat a pop-tart in the car and his father wouldn't let him and was hoping to teach him a lesson about procrastination and parents meaning what they say.  Alex had a flair for the dramatic and pitched quite the fit.  "If I don't eat breakfast, then I won't be able to concentrate!  If I can't concentrate, then I won't do well on my test!  Then that will wreck my GPA!  AND IT WILL DESTROY MY DREAM OF BECOMING A PANDA VET!!!!!"  

Sigh.  Good times.  

I'm not a huge fan of Carolyn DeAngelis' original panda pattern, so I decided to make some modifications to her Christmas bear pattern:

I liked the general shape of the body and the changes to the face seemed easy enough.  I had seen another panda ornament on the web that was clutching a bamboo stalk, so I sort of made something up.  I just rolled up a piece of felt and tied it with thread.  I cut some small leaves and glued those on.  It turned out well and Alex enjoyed the stroll down memory lane!

Happy Belated New Year!

Wow . . . . I can't believe I haven't posted since AUGUST!!  Did you think I'd been kidnapped by aliens?  I wish it were something that glamorous and exciting.  The short story -- which is about all you want to hear about my personal life on a blog about felt Christmas ornaments -- is that we inherited/got/took in another stray kid in the fall.  (I really don't know what the right word is.  It's not a traditional foster care situation.)  Now my house has TWO teenagers and all that goes with that.  Additionally, we moved my 94 year-old grandmother from her home four hours away to an assisted living facility 5 minutes from me back in November.  I try to go over every day for at least half an hour.

So . . . here is what my "immediate" family looks like now:

All of that activity has left me precious little time for stitching.  I didn't abandon it completely and I do have a few new ornaments to post.  I did several that were duplicates of ones I'd already done and I didn't think you needed to see another Ashland Eagle.  (And trust me . . . I didn't want to STITCH another Ashland Eagle, either!  I think that's my last one in this life.)

Consider this a late "Fond Farewell to 2015" post and enjoy this photo of all the ornaments I did manage to finish last year.  

Tinkerbell

This is an ornament I wanted to make in 2014 to commemorate our trip to Disney.  I didn't have a pattern and ran out of time to design something, so it just didn't get done.  I'm glad I waited because something showed up on Pinterest this year that worked great!  First . . . a little back story.

Mariah had never been to Disney and we didn't want her to be any older before she went.  Scott had sworn about 20 years ago that he would NEVER go again, so I really had to exercise the power of persuasion to get him on board.  We decided to go in the fall when it would still be warm and the crowds would be low.  We pulled Mariah out of school for 2 days -- we are THOSE parents -- and flew down for a long weekend.  At that time of year, there's a special event called Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween Party.  The park opens after hours and everyone is in costume.  There's a special parade, special fireworks, etc.

Mariah had NO idea about this trip.  It was a complete surprise.  We picked her up from school at lunch time and drove straight to the airport.  We told her when we left school where we were going.  We did not, however, say one word to her about the Halloween event.  Unbeknownst to her, I had made costumes for all three of us.  I worked on them during the day when she was in school and had them stashed in our storage room.  

Our first day at Disney World was great.  Mariah bought the customary Minnie ears and wore them for the duration: 

We told her we were coming back to the hotel to rest for a bit and then go out to dinner.  When we got back to our room, we asked her to open one of our suitcases.  (It had all the costumes in it.)

Mariah was Tinkerbell, Scott was Woody, and I was Minnie.  Here are a few shots of us as we headed out for a really fun evening.  

I had big plans for making all three ornaments, but that didn't happen.  I had kind of let it go when I saw this on Pinterest:

I couldn't track down an actual pattern, so I used this as inspiration to design something and here's what I came up with:

Mariah loves it and it's the perfect souvenir for a really happy memory . . . even if it is a year late!

West Holmes Knight

I shared in an earlier post that Mariah would be starting high school this fall.  Our school's mascot is a knight, so I knew I wanted to make that into an ornament somehow.  I didn't really see a Carolyn DeAngelis pattern that I could adapt easily.  Since I can't draw, I knew I needed to buy some clipart.  I headed over to Etsy and did a search for "knight clipart."  That led me to this set, which I ultimately bought.  $6 is a bargain for the amount of images you get.

I was particularly taken by this one:

A suicide mission in terms of making an ornament, right?  Feeling bold, I decided to take the plunge and convert this to a pattern.  I really wasn't in love with the horse's head.   For starters, it's to cartoonish for me and not the look I was going for.  Secondly, I didn't like the head covering thing.  I did a Google search for horse clipart and came across this:

I figured I could do a head transplant and make something work!  It took awhile to get the pieces right and it took even longer to stitch the ornament, but it was TOTALLY worth it because I think this is probably the most magnificent ornament I've made so far.  See what you think:

And to give you an idea of the scale:  

I'm not gonna lie . . . this was a beast.  I had about 15 hours of stitching time in it and that doesn't include the time it took to design the pattern or cut the pieces.  But it was totally worth it, don't you think??  Mariah LOVES it!

I posted a picture of it on Facebook and told people they could, indeed, place orders.  The selling price?  One million dollars!  I can tell you for sure that this is a one-of-a-kind!

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.  

Painter Pauline

It's funny . . . I've looked through all my Carolyn DeAngelis patterns at least a million times, but they just hit me differently on different days depending on my mood.  I was looking for a pattern and stumbled across Painter Pauline.  She's never interested me before, but this time I immediately thought of this painting that Mariah did in art class.  It was chosen to be included in a county-wide student art show.

I thought it would be a really cute way to commemorate that achievement by incorporating it into an ornament.  I thought the ornament had some cute details, so I got to work on those.  I matched up the colors in Mariah's painting to my felt and used those colors for the palette.  I Googled "dollhouse miniature paint brush" and found this image:

I figured I could make that work by painting some wooden toothpicks.  Next, I laid her painting on the floor and took a picture of it.

Then I scanned it into my computer, put it into my Print Shop program and shrunk it down to about 1.5" x 2".  I printed it on cardstock and mounted it to a thin piece of cardboard.  There's a lot going on with this ornament and her hands are certainly full, but look how cute she is!

It doesn't show up well in the picture, but the hat is black and the legs are navy.  This is the first time I've done a pattern where the feet are turned in.  It was tempting to turn them out, since that's how all my other ornaments are, but I decided to stay true to the pattern.  Ditto for the little buttons.  Carolyn shows them this way -- cut with a hole punch and a little "V" nipped out of them.  Here's a close-up of the paintbrushes:

Making an ornament really personal is one of my favorite things to do.  This Flat Zach ornament from a few years ago is still on my greatest hits list.  When you take the time to give it that little personal touch, I guarantee your recipient will really treasure it.  I managed to make this one without Mariah seeing it and I can't WAIT to see her face on tree decorating day!

Sammy the Sea Turtle

I posted Serena the Seahorse last time and told you that I'd ordered the pattern from an Etsy shop called Squishy Cute Designs.  When I was ordering, I perused the other patterns, too, and stumbled across the magnificent Sammy the Sea Turtle pattern.  I'm not really into turtles, but our family did have a great turtle encounter last summer on our Mexico vacation.  

We had rented a house on the beach and there were lots of signs and roped-off places in our general vicinity marking where sea turtles had laid eggs.  My husband got up early one morning to find some conservationists on the beach right outside our house.  A turtle was out there laying eggs!  We got both kids up to watch and we had the opportunity to watch the mother tossing sand out of the hole and then crawl out and return to the ocean when she was finished.  

When I saw this pattern, I immediately thought of this experience and knew I wanted to make the ornament to commemorate it.  It's a really basic turtle design, but I love what she did with the stitching detail and the embellishments like sequins, beads, and buttons.  Even with all the little shell pieces, it was a relatively quick ornament to make.  And it turned out great!

(It's hard to tell in this picture, but the green felt for the shell is a darker green than what I used for the body.)