Finally....

I had a really great time crafting this holiday season. I started calling my craft room, my studio and I got in to the habit of telling my husband that I needed to go do my "work". It just felt good to use my materials...to see my embroidery thread disappear...to see the stack of empty thread spools grow. It was like a house cleaning purge in a whole new way.

The endorphin rush from finishing projects gives me a such a heady, dizzy feeling (because it happens so rarely). This season, when I would finish something...I would emerge from my studio and parade around for my husband beaming, like I had just won the lottery or "best hair" on senior day (we didn't have that kind of stuff at my high school...and I probably would have won "biggest hair", but whatever!)

I loved sitting in front of my husband's RIDICULOUSLY large TV and watching "Battlestar Galactica" in HD as I became a blanket-stitch wizard. This felt box was for my mother. I wanted to give her a blue bird of happiness to guide her into 2008. She loved it, more than I thought that she would...I mean she is my mom...But no, she really was gaga. (the picture is on the bad side, really doesn't do it justice, but that is what you get taking pictures @ 3am on Christmas morning)

There are really SO many bag tutorials out there, I must have read at least 50. Of course when it came down to it, I just winged it and made some really dippy prototypes. Eventually I came up with an idea that seemed to work and I will admit that I did some experimentation with fusible interfacing. I am not "in love" with working with it....BUT I will admit that it makes for a very smart looking bag---maybe the first thing that you would say is "Wow, nice bag" instead of "Hey, did you make that?" That whole issue is one I will continue to grapple with. I realized, as I continued my craft-o-rama, that I felt that I needed to make each person on my list A LOT of things in order to compensate for them being homemade/handmade....I never feel this way when gifting something from a craft fair. Maybe by next year I will make my projects a jazzy label and that will solve that issue for me...we will see.

This was my second favorite thing that I made (after the fleece pillow friends for my boys--see above). I have TOTALLY fallen in LOVE with free-piecing patchwork and making parts and having them come together rather organically rather than drafting a pattern on Electric Quilt. The blog class I participated in really was such an inspiration. I free-motion quilted words that I think of when I think of my sister Reba, and it felt a bit like a journaling quilt, similar to some painted pieces by Ali Edwards.

Reflecting back on these projects and the times that I had creating them makes me feel really content and happy. I will say that I have been totally EXHAUSTED these past few days, since Christmas. I don't think that I went to sleep before midnight this past month. I do think that I will try and continue to hand make my gifts. I also think that I will give myself more time and maybe branch out in to different media (I just love to sew SO much) as sewing takes A LOT of time. It is funny how in hindsight all the little problems just get lost in the glow of the holiday....I didn't even write about the things that I gave up on...or the jean quilt that I started for my husband that I swear I will finish by his birthday in February....Argghhhh sewing old jeans... but that is for another time.

JMB