Christmas 2010 Revealed!

I have finally given all of my handmade gifts and gotten pictures for most of them. I was really bad at remembering to photograph my projects this year. So, in no particular order, here is a show and tell of what had me holed up in my sewing room for the better part of December...

Apron #1 for my sister. "tis the season to eat chocolate..."  Totally her.

Apron #2 for my MIL. Plus a matching set of oven mitts. She wore it all Christmas day, and that made me happy. 

The oven mitts.

 I will admit that I now have a love/hate relationship with this particular project. I found this tutorial last year, but not in enough time to make some in time for Christmas. So I had it in the back of my mind all year that these would be my go-to gift for 2010. I couldn't get the pattern provided with the tutorial to print out correctly, so I just read through it and drafted up my own copy making a few minor adjustments.

The love part is how great they turned out. I packaged up each set with a cookie mix and everyone who received it seemed very pleased with the gift. It was also a lot of fun picking out all the fun Christmas fabrics and mixing and matching them. The hate part stems from the fact that I ended up making 14 sets of oven mitts. That is 28 oven mitts. That is a lot of oven mitts. And they just seemed to take much longer to sew up then I thought they should. I don't know that I will be making these again in the near future. I am kind of oven mitt-ed out! (And seriously bummed that I didn't make a set for myself before that happened...)

Three sets of Maine Morning Mitts and matching head-wraps with flower embellishments for my cousins.

Aw. Aren't they cute?

A matching neck pillow and fleece throw for my hubby.  

But not just your average blanket.  This one has pockets lined in minky for his feet.  He has nerve damage in  his legs and feet that have led to neuropathy, which basically means his feet are always cold.  He also doesn't have a lot of strength in his legs so if someone bumped into his feet it would knock his legs out from under the blanket. A common phrase around our house in the evening was, "Would someone please cover my feet."  Now even if his feet are knocked off the foot rest they stay warm and covered while he picks his leg up and puts it back. It's a stroke of genius if I do say so myself!

This is the girls Christmas outfits. (This is Lila's as Evie's is in the laundry after the first wearing...) The skirts are slightly different styles, so matching with out being exact. They also have white tights with red snowflakes on them. I will have to get a picture of these outfits in action soon.

The one project I haven't finished! Jake's vest.  It's made out of the same yarn as the girls' tops. I am so close. Just have to bind off the shoulders and knit the ribbing around the neck and armholes.  I also made him a tie to match the girls' skirts.  They look pretty darn cute all together. 

One of my favorite projects! A Harry Potter sweater for my nephew Huck.  I couldn't resist, I mean he even has the right initial and everything!  Plus my brother and sis-in-law are big movie buffs so I knew it would be appreciated. 

This is the best shot I could find of the kids in their Christmas Eve jammies. The girls nightgowns were pictured in the previous post, but here you can mostly see Jake's. The shirt says Reindeer Games on it so I picked a great soft flannel in heathery green and grey for his pants. I'll be sad when the day comes that I can buy a pair of pants cheaper then I can make them for that kid. 

Some of the other projects that missed the camera were a pair of grey striped socks for my husband, a pair of purple lace work socks for my SIL Elena, a pair of fingerless mitts in lovely dark green and blues for my brother (I thought they would be good for doing photography).  I don't know, it's doesn't seem like that much now that it's all listed up there... or maybe that's like forgetting the labor pains once the baby is born.