My latest beaded items: Bells and Christmas Circles

I have been very busy over the past month making a bunch of beaded Christmas Bells and Christmas Circles. I got the patterns from one of my Yahoo Group friends who had made some. I had looked for the bell pattern for over a year and the only pattern I could find I didn't like.

I decided that I would make a bunch of each in a multitude of colors. In fact, Since I took these photos, I have made others in different colors, like red and green bells and red and clear bells. They almost look like candy canes they way the stripes turned out on them.

I have three round Christmas tins filled up with bells and circles now. I just love making them and they are so easy to do. You just need to invest in a lot of beads if you plan on making a bunch of them. I had a lot of trouble finding the oat beads in silver and gold, but I finally found a place in Gastonia, NC call Mary Jo's that had them. (Mary Jo's is one of the best fabric stores around, but I find all kinds of treasures in there!)

Anyways, what got me to want a bunch of these bells for myself is that I was remembering some of the ornaments that my mom uses to decorate her tree with. My ex-step-grandmother had made a bunch of bells and given them to my mom for her Christmas tree. I always thought they very pretty. I had forgotten all about them until a year or two ago and then went on a manhunt to find a pattern. No such luck. I searched all over the Internet trying to find a pattern for them. I just didn't like the pattern I found. It looked good in the picture, but when I made one, it didn't look like what I wanted.

So when I was in the Yahoo Group, EasyOrnaments, I looked through the pictures and found a lady who had made some bells like I remembered. She sent me a copy of the pattern along with the pattern for the Christmas Circle. And I haven't stopped making them yet!

Here are the pictures of the bells and circles that I have made.


















I hope you enjoy seeing these pictures!

Beaded Christmas Ornaments

I have been busy making beaded Christmas ornaments for the kids on my school bus to put in their treat bags. Here are some that I have made so far.

More projects I did

Here is a few more blankets I made. I liked the nativity scene and figured it would be good to use during the Christmas season.

The other is a fleece baby blanket. I don't have a specific person in mind for this blanket, but eventually someone I know will have a baby and I will be ready with a gift!

Christmas presents I made for my grandkids

Here are three of the four items I made for my grandkids for Christmas. My grandson will get the fleece baby blanket and the fleece pillow. My granddaughter gets the teddy bear. I also made her a fleece John Deere jacket but I don't have a picture of that yet. I still need to sew on some elastic so she can button the jacket.

Another quilt down, 1/2 of one to go.

I finished up one more Yo-Yo Quilt last week. I am halfway finished with the third quilt. Christmas is almost halfway finished now!! Yippeee!!!! LOL!! I will have to work on getting my craft room up and running when I am done with this last quilt. I am going to need the room for my next quilt project!!

My husband is letting me have the front bedroom in this apartment as my "craft room", or "crap room" as he calls it. We are going to move out the computer desk and a dresser into the living room. We have been using this room as the computer room for a couple of years now and it is time for a change. Since we use the dresser for storage of computer and "office" stuff, it can go into the living room with the desk and computer.

We will move the other desk that is in the basement into the front bedroom so I can use it for my scrapbooking and cutting my fabric. I will also move my sewing machine and all of my craft totes into that room. Goodbye extra closet for jackets we don't use, and hello to stacking those nice wide three drawer totes full of craft supplies in there! Goodbye Halloween decorations which will be banished to the basement where they belong anyways! LOL Goodbye games that never get played because we can't get to them and hello shelf for other supplies, such as scrappbooking.

Any and all computer stuff leftinthe chest-on-chest will be banished to the living room so I can store all of my fabric in it. (I have a huge tote full of fabric and then some! LOL)

Once all this moving around is done, then I can start on a quilt for my granddaughter, who has informed me that "I have to make her a quilt". Hopefully, I will be able to get it done for Christmas as well. It iwll be a "Denim rag Quilt". Demin on the front and flannel on the back. I have never sewn denim before, so it might be a bit of a challange for me. At least I don't have to worry about the newest grandbaby yet. I still have a couple of years before I will "have to make a quilt" for him! LOL I do, hovwever, have to get busy and make the fleece blanket for him before he is born, so I guess I will be making that next before I start moving everything. That is only a two hour job, so it won't take too long to finish.

At least I have my sewing machine "marinating" in oil. I hadn't oiled it in probably close to a year, so I went ahead and oiled it down last week. I also fixed my grandmother's old Singer Featherweight 221K about a month ago. Everyone who quilts is on the hunt for one, and I haven't been able to use it in several years, as it had "frozen" up on me. I bought a book off of ebay on fixing it and now it runs like a dream again! Thank goodness I don't mind getting dirty and oily to fix things, huh? LOL Now I will be able to do some machine quilting when the time comes.