Holiday Craftiness

I had some grand plans about holiday crafting this year. I was going to make some autumn-themed coasters for several family members to be delivered at Thanksgiving and thought I would make something handmade for everyone for Christmas. Oh, I was going to make entirely new decorations for the house, too. Uh-huh. Can I blame those crazy thoughts on pregnancy brain? We’ll go with that.

I started out well and had several projects cut out and ready to go when I got a call from my mom that one of my great-aunts had died unexpectedly. The three of us were planning to make the drive to Pennsylvania for Thanksgiving, but Alex and I ended up making the trip about a week earlier than planned for the funeral. In the span of three days, I packed up everything we would need for the duration of the trip (including all fabrics, notions, and my sewing machine), drove 15 hours in one day to eastern Pennsylvania for my aunt’s funeral, and then drove 6 hours the next day to my mom’s house in western Pennsylvania, where we would be staying for the Thanksgiving holiday. Whew! That was quite a trip for a 4 year old and his 30 week pregnant mama! I’m glad we were able to be there for my uncle and family, though.

Since my family lives so far away, we alternate holidays between Pennsylvania and Alabama. Since this year was our Thanksgiving year, that also meant we were “doing Christmas” that week, too. I managed to get the Christmas gifts done for everyone, but had to drop my plans for the Thanksgiving gifts. Maybe next year. Using the awesome tutorial from Moonstitches, I made several owl garlands. Some were family names, but most were the basic (and short!) NOEL greeting. Sorry for the poor quality of the photo – natural light is limited these days and I never seem to remember to take photos during that 20 minutes of the day.

As part of the Christmas gift-giving this year, my grandmother got me some things I’ve been looking at for quite awhile. I’ve been waiting for them to go on clearance, but Target doesn’t seem to want to cooperate. Meet The Ducks.

I just love how the little ducks are all chatty, but the big one seems to have a look on her face that says, “These are *not* my children.” The little guys came decorated for the holidays, but I still think I need to supplement their wardrobes in some way.

There is still more crafting to be done before the actual Christmas holiday, so that’s my plan for today while Alex is at school. I guess I’d better get to it!

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