Thanksgiving has come and gone, which leaves me license to bring my yearly, all-out Christmas obsession to the front burner for a while. I usually catch the sickness around the end of October, but am forced by curmudgeonly friends and neighbors and society at large to keep it under control until the "acceptable" time to begin preparations.

The truth is, I just love the season. Its not about presents or decorations or making it all perfect, really. I just love making things, love arranging them the way I like them, and simply creating that happy little world for those people willing to appreciate it.

This season I want to participate in the Month of Softies project, hopefully by making a hanging advent calendar that comes in the form of 25 tiny Christmas ornaments that can hold little treats. I don't want to give away what each ornament will be, but I'm very excited about it. And, thankfully, my local fabric store is obliging my obsession by having a blowout fabric sale this Saturday. :)

Posted by katybeck at 01:00 PM | Comments (0)

So, last night, inspired by this amazing lady, I went into a snowflake cutting frenzy. Not for hanging on the ceiling (I just got done painting our townhouse walls and I am NOT getting back up on that ladder again for anything!) but for decorating our front bay window. Our tree is in front of the window, and from the street I want people to see the white lights of the tree diffused by lots of lovely, tiny snowflakes.

I had a large stash of freezer paper left over from quilting class, so I used a lot of that since its pretty stable for being so thin. The Debbie Travis and Divine Design christmas specials were excellent aids to my festive and creative mood. :)

Then this morning I crept downstairs and started to tape them to the windows. The "panes" of the bay window are actually cheap plastic that I can pull slightly away from the glass, so it was easy to slip a few flakes underneath for an even covering. Such fun! The only downside is that I can't find my tape dispenser, so I'm stuck cutting zillions of tiny pieces of clear tape with scissors.

Despite the HUGE pile of teensy paper bits covering my basement, you can never have too many snowflakes! I'm even toying with the idea of grabbing some lightweight vellum in different colors so that the "snow" is a mixture of blue and white flakes.

Will post pictures soon!

Update: It took me until the end of January to finally take this photograph, but it was worth it to capture it in the real snow. :)

Posted by katybeck at 10:45 AM | Comments (1)

I managed to get most of my holiday shopping/wrapping done this weekend, and I felt great relief and accomplishment when I trotted into the post office on Sunday afternoon and shipped them all off to Dallas.

A note about the post office - I have only good things to say about my local USPS outpost lately.. Not only are they open on Sundays (news to me, although it could have been this way for a long while), but they now have an efficient take-a-number system which allows you to find a seat and relax while you wait instead of getting knots in your shoulders waiting in line holding your packages. And they now have kiosks - shiny, new kiosks that weigh your package for you, give you all manner of shipping options, and print out your label for you on sticky paper. Then there is a HUGE metal drum (that will fit even large packages up to 70 lbs) to drop it into. Its very satisfying to close the drum, turn it, and hear your package slide down on the other side where you know it will be on its way. Glee!

Once I shipped off all that stuff, I rewarded myself with a quick (ha!) trip to Joann's. Where I picked up green, red, and antique white felt, embroidery thread, and ribbon to start work on my contribution to the Month of Softies. Now a small felt bomb has gone off in our basement from my feverish crafting. Such fun!

Posted by katybeck at 11:53 AM | Comments (0)

Here's a sneak preview of my take on this month's Month of Softies theme. I haven't quite finished them yet, but they were just so cute I had to take pictures of them in progress!

So here's the concept: an interactive advent calendar. There will be 25 in all, each with their number embroidered on it. At the beginning of advent you hang them all on your tree, and then each day you hunt about to find the one you get to open. I envision each one being filled with little candies or notes or tiny gifts. I would have had such a ball with this as a little kid! :)

Oh, and I adapted the patterns for most of these bags from the the excellent Square Bottomed Lined Bag Tutorial (a la Jordy) over at Craftster. Many thanks!

Posted by katybeck at 08:38 AM | Comments (3)