More Christmas decorations.......

I've been decorating the house and thought it would be fun to post a couple of items. My dad was a tailor before he retired. He made us Christmas stockings when we were little. As we got married and had families of our own, he would make stockings as close to the ones he made me and my brother. They weren't exactly alike since the material was a little different. When I look back, I think this may have been my first exposure to quilting or patchwork, as my dad called it.

He had fabric that was commercially available with embroidered Christmas items. He would cut around the embroidery and make a stocking. He knew someone with an embroidery machine who embroidered our names on the top. My stocking is exactly the same but the colors are just red and green. This is my son's stocking which is the last one he made since he's the youngest grandchild.

I took a hand applique class with Mary Sorenson quite a few years ago. This is the quilt she gave us to practice some of her techniques. I actually display it year round. She had some very neat techniques to teach us. I'm not sure if I remember them all but I did keep all my class papers she passed out. This was fun to make. I also hand quilted it but machine quilted the borders and also sewed the binding on by machine.

This was a stocking we bought for our cat, Ricky! I didn't want him to feel left out so I decided to add this also. We've had it for years and actually put a few toys in there for him every year. He doesn't always like what we got so we end up playing with them hoping he'll join in. He usually doesn't! I think he may be laughing at us when we're not looking! We just like including him whether he appreciates it or not!!