New Year’s Resolutions

 (An update of a previous blog.  I am hoping if I post it, it will motivate me to complete my resolution.)

How many of you make New Year’s Resolutions?  Is it to stop a bad habit or lose weight or exercise more?  Getting healthy sure is a good thing to do.

But what if your resolution was to be more creative?  What if you made a promise to yourself to do more art or sewing or learn a new craft? 

 Every year I go through my unfinished quilting projects and decide which one I am going to finish for the upcoming quilt show in March.  It is amazing to me when I find I only have a little more to do on a project for it to be finished. 

Other years I have promised myself to take advantage of the classes my quilt guild offers.  I have learned different ways to quilt on my home sewing machine, new ways to appliqué, new embroidery stitches (after a recent class with our guild I can now do a successful bullion stitch) and can now piece a Y-seam in a quilt block.

This coming year 2022 I want to try more embroidery techniques.  I plan to join a hand embroidery group at a local quilt shop.  There are two quilt tops that I want to add embroidery too.  I am hoping if I work on it around other people will motivate me to actually do it but also help me to get ideas of motifs to embroider and stitches to use. 

Why not make sure you add some creativity to your resolutions list?  You can still break a bad habit, lose weight and exercise more but make sure you also create new art that represents who you are and what your 2022 brought to your life.

Happy 2022 to you.

Cheryl

 

©2017, 2019, 2021 - Cheryl Fillion

Christmas Ornament 2021

Every year I make an ornament to give to family and friends.  I have been doing this for many years.  This year I decided to take a necklace idea I had for my yoyo talk in August and turn it into an ornament.

What made it fun was I got to buy and use holiday buttons. I have always enjoyed buttons. I remember going through this light blue round tin container my mother had for her buttons.  I never had a reason to use any, I just liked the look and shape and color of so many buttons.  Now a days I especially like the novelty ones.  They are bright and imaginative but I don’t often use novelty buttons for my clothes.  I just stick to the faithful round ones. But this gave me a reason to buy some Christmas buttons.  There were candy canes, and packages, gingerbread men and ornaments.  One packet had a sleigh, reindeer, Santa head, and Christmas tree.  All these buttons were shank buttons but buttons with holes would work just as well.

If you remember back in October, I wrote about making a necklace of yoyos and a flamingo button to go along with my talk on yoyos at my local Quilt guild.  Here is a picture of it. 

 

For the necklace I used a 2 1/4 inch yoyo (I started with a 5 inch circle), then the middle pink yoyo was 1 ½ inch yoyo (3 ½ inch circle) and on top was a 1 inch by 1 ½ inch oval (2 ½  by 3 ½  inch oval piece of fabric) and then top with the button.  I decided to use the same sizes for the ornaments, 

The holiday buttons were all kinds of shapes and sizes.  Some were bigger than the small oval yoyo so I decided to go with just the 2 round yoyos.  But then there were some small buttons that did not cover the hole in the yoyo like the bigger buttons did, so for some I used the oval yoyo after all.  The hole in the oval yoyo was small enough that ever the small buttons could cover it.

I had some Christmas fabric cut in 3.5 and 5 inches so I picked the colors from what I had cut.  If you do this ornament, you could mix and match or use all the same colors.  The one thing to consider is will your button show up on the fabric you choose.  You don’t want a primarily green button on a green yoyo; your button won’t show up very well.  You can see the tree in the picture below but it doesn’t stand out.  Take a look at the reindeer pictures above.  Can you tell the reindeer has antlers?  Not easily.  So, choosing the colors of your yoyos is important with what colored button you use.

See how much better the tree looks on the red yoyo.

Once you have your yoyos made, you have to sew they all together. (to be honest I made the yoyos as I made the ornament so I wouldn’t forget what fabric I was using for which button.) ,   Putting the ornament together I started from the top down.  I sewed the button on first yoyo and then sewed the rest of the yoyos together.  I found it easier to get the button on if I was just manipulating one yoyo (and then the threads were hidden).

When I attached yoyo to yoyo, I tried to hide my stitches under the top yoyo just like you would if you were appliqueing a picture for a quilt.  This is especially important when you are sewing on the bottom yoyo.  If your stitches just catch the first layer of fabric of the bottom yoyo, you won’t see any stitches on the back of the ornament. 

Once all the yoyos and button are sewn together just add a thread through the top edge of the biggest yoyo for a hanger.  I try to match the color of that big yoyo.  And I used perle cotton for the hanger as it is a bit thicker than regular sewing thread and is not likely to break.

And now you have a new ornament.  Happy Decorating.

 

©2021 Cheryl Fillion 

Celebrate Christmas All Month Long

 

I really love Christmas.  I tend to go all out.  I start playing my Christmas music before Thanksgiving.  I get out the books I have on Christmas customs and traditions and reread why we do the things we do.  I try to make my yearly ornaments to give out in early December.  I try to make the holiday last as long as I can.  And one friend described my decorated house as sensory overload.

While looking for a celebration to write about this month besides Christmas, I found there are all kinds of days in December set aside to get you ready for the big holiday itself.

December 6^th is St. Nicholas Day.  In some parts of Europe and even here in the States, this is the day when St Nicholas (Santa Claus) comes for an early visit.  There actually was a St. Nicholas who was an Archbishop in Turkey back in the 5^th century.  He became the patron saint of boys and December 6^th is his birthday and on this day he is known for bringing little gifts for the good children, and sticks for the bad. 

 If you are Christmas Card sender, December 9^th is Christmas Card Day.  If you haven’t gotten your cards yet, this might be a good day.  Or maybe this is the day to make cards.  Wouldn’t Grandma prefer a hand made card from the little ones than a store bought one?

Poinsettias, considered the flower of Christmas, have their own day on December 12^th.  So make sure you get out to your favorite garden store to pick out your festive plant.  December 14^th is Roast Chestnuts Day.  If you are not much of a chestnut person, how about picking up those other nuts you might eat.  A favorite part of Christmas growing up was going to the local grocers to get our bag of mixed nuts (only available this time of year).  They would have bins of unshelled nuts.  My favorite then and now were the walnuts.

And what is Christmas without the cookies.  Well, December 18^th is set aside just to get those holiday sweets completed for Santa’s visit with Bake Cookies Day.  And so you don’t forget that tree, Look for an Evergreen Day is December 19^th.  And while you are getting ready, why not take a break on December 20^th and celebrate Go Caroling Day.

If by now in the month you are bogged down with shopping and decorating and feeling a bit overwhelmed, there is a day for you to go ahead and just feel a little like Scrooge.  December 21^st is Humbug Day.  Just don’t let it last more than a day.

And finally on December 24^th, hopefully all the preparations are done and you can sit back and enjoy a little eggnog for it is not just Christmas Eve but also Nation Egg Nog Day.

If you are one who likes to have Christmas last as long as you can, go ahead and celebrate it all month long.  And Merry Christmas to you.

 

©2018, 2021 Cheryl Fillion