Festive Craft Time

For some reason, I am feeling particularly excited about Christmas this year; so I've decided to embrace the opportunity for some extra-glittery crafts and a dedicated Christmas board on Pinterest. I spent my weekend pinning, stitching and stabbing myself repeatedly in the thumb to make our very own fabric advent calendar. 

I decided to be thrifty with my choice of fabrics, and use leftover scraps from my fabric cupboard - so I'd have more money left to spend on the treats to put in the pockets! The only truly festive fabric I could find was left over from my patchwork quilt, so for the rest of the pockets I used a mixture of printed cotton and old clothes. Pocket 8 is part of a rather hilarious pair of pants (never worn because they were a bit too frilly), and 16 is part of a pair of trousers from my punk days (too big for me now. Hurrah!)

I was hoping to sew the pockets onto a green felt background, but I only had a weeny bit left in my stash, and unfortunately the Patchwork Dog (my local magical cavern of haberdashery and beautiful fabric) had already sold out. Clearly my neighbourhood crafters start their Christmas planning in October! Instead, I bought some green and red tartan brushed cotton, and then managed to fashion a felt Christmas tree shape from the "leaves" of my Poison Ivy 23rd Birthday costume (although the photo of my friend Dan and I below makes it look like we went as Popeye and Olive Oil!)

I'm really pleased with how it's come out. It's bigger than I was expecting about 1.5 x .75m but I wanted to make reasonably large pockets so I can fill them with goodies :)

I backed it with part of a faux-patchwork blanket I picked up from a charity last year for a bargainous £2.50. I thought the muted shades worked well with the colours I've used on the front, and it's given an additional home-made feel without having to spend more time at my sewing machine. 

This is my favourite pocket- I love the tape measure ribbon

I sewed the bias binding onto all the pockets at the same time- it looked like Christmas Bunting; I was a little sad to chop it up!

Using one of my beautiful stag buttons from Fran :)

These are from a box of letter-printed beads I used to make friendship bracelets from during the 90s. This is basically a nostalgia blanket.

It's a bit wonky and certainly very home-made looking- but that was totally the point! (Honest!) I'm really looking forward to 1st December when I can start filling this up with festive treats, and I hope this is something I can pass down to future generations*. 

Katie xxx

* As long as it doesn't fall to pieces from the weight of all the chocolate!

P.S. I'm linking this up with the lovely Lakota's Ta Dah Tuesday