Years ago I had a short caftan that I really liked. I had purchased it at J C Penney and was able to get another one the next year, but the third year they no longer carried them. I asked a friend who is good at copying patterns if she could make a pattern for it off of the one I had. She did that as well as made me several different ones. I still have one of those that she made for me. She also gave me the pattern, and I proceeded to make them for myself. I decided to lengthen it to a long version and started making them with flannel. I like to have two long, flannel ones so that one can be in the wash. Here's one I just made today to replace one that has a hole in it from my cat's claws. I bought the flannel several years ago.

Julia loves pillows, including this one that I made her with a remnant from the backing of her quilt (minky).

I used a row of decorative stitching to attach the fabric to some batting, then sewed the two pieces together, turned and stuffed.

 

This is a birthday card for my friend, Shirley, whose birthday is in December. The cross stitch chart is from Stoney Creek, Autumn 2017.

Iris recently passed a difficult level in her swim classes. I made her this hair bun tie (she wears them all the time) to congratulate her. I used a machine embroidery design on the ends, and decorative fishy stitch on my sewing machine.

 

Knitting hats can be addictive! I knit three "Top This" hats from DMC, a ladybug for Iris, an owl for Sonja, and a lion for Julia. Then I knit a bear for a friend (she wasn't inclined to deal with the cast on or knitting in the round). Somewhere in the mix, I knit a hat for Julia's Halloween costume with fringe all over to make it a lion hat.  I'm thinking I'll make more to donate to a local charity in honor of some of my friends that I might otherwise buy or make gifts for. I'm just thinking that more "stuff", even if it's hand made, is not what most of my friends want or need at this time of life. We're all thinking in terms of downsizing. 

 

If you like hand work, these felt kits are fun to do. The tradition of Christmas felt kit decor started with my mother who made me a beautiful tree skirt. I made one for her, too. Then came the felt kit stockings for our family, and we've added new ones for new family members as they came along. This one is for Julia. I still have one to make for Sonja, but I made Julia's first because Emelie uses them in her home. Leslie uses other stockings and keeps the felt ones here, so Sonja doesn't need hers yet.

One last reversible table topper with napkins. I actually made the napkins and pieced the table topper last year but reached a roadblock trying to figure out how to make a fat quarter cover the back. It just wasn't big enough, so finally this year I decided to use a different fabric and machine embroidery appliqued leaves on it. I then used a decorative stitch for the quilting. Now we will get to enjoy it for the rest of the season. The only purchase I needed to make to finish this was another spool of thread . Another UFO done! 

This should have had more of a woven look in the pattern,

but two of the fabrics were too similar to have the desired effect.



 

 



I had quite a bit of the poinsettia fabric, so I made a reversible table topper to go with both sides of the placemats. Merwin had a 45º plexiglass triangle made for me to cut the angles for the octagon.

 

 

I also found fabric I liked for napkins, but the quilt shop only had a couple of fat quarters, so I did my web searching and found it online. I made 8 napkins.

 

 

 



 

Here is another wicker chest topper I made with more of the poinsettia fabric (and the centerpiece I will use on the table), backed with another fabric that I purchased at about the same time to make it reversible.