Christmas Makes

I think that how ready you feel for Christmas is a relative thing. Last Tuesday, I did most of the present shopping right under the the nose of the littlest girl (admittedly, this meant a bit of letting her play merrily at one end of the toy department whilst the helpful shop assistant stashed things into bags at the other). I came home feeling pleased - and organised.

And then I had a conversation with a table of ladies at my Christmas Workshop at Fancy, where all of them had not only got all their presents sorted out, but had wrapped them, too (and, no doubt, sent out Christmas cards). Ah, okay, I thought. Not feeling so smug now, are we. I dared not admit I hadn't even started making the presents I'd intended to make.

I still haven't started making Christmas presents. Nothing like a deadline to get me motivated - knowing me, I will probably start next week!

My Christmas makes did get off to a very gentle start the weekend before last - as I hopped on the train down to London with some friends to go to the Christmas Crafty Pint.

With no idea or plan of what we'd make until we got there, the first workshop we chose to do was one making fabric wreaths. This I knew would be love at first sight. Piles of pretty fabrics to choose from and turn into something lovely to hang up every Christmas. 

It took us all rather a long time to make the wreaths - probably well over two hours. Much tearing up of fabric and cutting into strips had to be done, ready to knot the fabric pieces onto the florist wreaths we've been given. Still, there was nothing hard about it - and so this was a perfect thing to do whilst chatting with friends.

And, whilst we worked, we were treated to the sound of some live music provided by these three lovely ladies.

Next up we chose to have a go at felting. Here we are, rubbing our balls to get them to stick and take on a nice round shape!

This took some time...

We left the venue, all of us really chuffed with our Christmas makes. None of us had been to this crafty event before, but I can see it becoming an annual day out.

The wreath I made has been hanging up for a week now, and, now that I have been out to buy a Christmas tree today, the balls will get displayed soon, too. I have spent the afternoon resisting doing any tree decorating (beyond lights, that is) until I pick the girls up from school, as I promised them we'd do it together.

We'll have to see if I really can hand over creative control to three small girls, sit back a bit and fight the urge to rearrange everything and give directional cries of "not there" and "don't hang six things on one branch when there's a great big bald bit over there...". I may need to busy myself with hanging up the Christmas bunting instead. Ah, and ironing it first (due to shoving it clumsily into a box at the end of last year's taking down of decorations).

Anyhow, if you are reading this and still haven't made any Christmas presents - well, hopefully I have made you feel better. I promise I am not lying and genuinely have not started yet - there's plenty of time, right?!

And, if you're in the Bedford area, you might like to know there's still a few spaces left on my final Christmas Workshop at my lovely local, The Burnaby Arms. This time we're mixing sewing with booze - the £10 workshop fee treats you to a glass of mulled wine and a mince pie (as well as your materials) when you book in advance (see Paypal icon to the right).

Let's see what some mulled wine does to fuel everyone's sewing, shall we?