Sewing: Custom Christmas Stockings

When I brought out the Christmas Boxes mid-December, excited about the traditional heirloom hand-me-down ornaments and stockings, plus cards and books therein, little did I suspect that I'd be in for a few surprises least of which was a bunch of fat ants and a few empty candy cane wrappers - yeah, I had happily packed away sweet juicy candy cane I had used as ornaments on the tree last year.

And, no stockings! Not a single one of the four I have used for the past several years. I was particularly sad to not find the one D's mom had knitted for D when he was little and was his stocking all through his life so far.

When I put away the stuff after last Christmas, I had packed away the stockings not in the usual Xmas Box, but safely elsewhere. Only, I had turned the house upside down and still didn't find it. It couldn't have walked away. I know it is there somewhere, biding its time, hiding snugly under something, just out of sight.

Anyway, it was just a few days to Christmas and rather than getting upset about it, I took it as a sign that the Universe was trying to tell me to make my own.

That's how these customized stockings - for the kids, D and me, plus the two kitties and a surprise visitor - came into existence with the help of my sewing machine.

Oggie's has little cars and a bus which seem to be his favorite these days. I tried giving him Ana's hand-me-down June doll and Polly pappa, but, he naturally gravitated towards excavator and fire truck and of course, Bus! So I wanted to capture that memory in his stocking. Plus, Oggie has preferred the color blue so far, with no real push - explicit or subliminal - from me. So, I wanted to have blue print for his stocking as well.

Ana was helping me make the stockings. I had this pile of scrap fabric I was going to use. She saw the colorful fleece print that I had used for her jammy-pants and rice bags and she loves that print - so, at her request, I had to use that fabric for her stocking, along with Rudolph, Santa, and Snowman, of course.

D's is plain blue corduroy on the back, no frills. And mine has my favorite patchwork quilt style piecing in bright yellow scraps.

All four has red one one side and customized colors on the other side as above.

The kitties' are smaller with scrap red velvety fabric for the back.

I decided to make the foot portion rather large so Santa can stuff little things all the way from toe to heel and then some!

Anyway, nothing great about this project, except that it was done in record-time, with a lot of love and patience, full of hopes and prayers that these stockings that the Universe arranged the circumstances to allow me to create for my family will someday be hung up by Ana and Oggie in their homes along with my grandkids'...

And then again, I could be careful like last year and put it away safely in some place and not find it next year...