*** Holiday Planning, 2012 ***

[Ivy]

I've made out a list of people we give gifts to during the holidays.

I'm slowly crocheting gifts right now. My biggest "challenge" right now are 2 unfinished afghans for 1 1/2 year old grandson and 3 1/2 year old grandson. I seem to pokey because I get involved with the house, pen palling, reading and other things.

I put doing them, on an on-line calendar reminder to come into my inbox daily to visually remind me, in case I'm ignoring my to do list or notebook. After the afghans I will make 4 more beanies and then 2 panda helmets for the 2 youngest grandsons, too.

At least I'm motivated!

[Nancy]

Getting canned goods for easy make ahead meals & restocking deep freezer with some meat and gathering some baking items that had run out feels great to be making progress on this and some stuff in a bag left over veggies and stock & meat for crock pot soup for the cooler days that are coming.

Did a bit of knitting also today.

Got some bird seed to put in gift in a bag for grand kids to have in their stockings to bring over and "help" feeding the chickens instead of rain deer food. Treats will have some oatmeal w/ raisins in with this I hope to develop some home made scratch as they were out of chicken food at the store.

[Ivy]

I've been crocheting on hats for Christmas today. I'm having a "problem" with one though. Oh, well. Tomorrow's another day, right? 3 down, 1 in the works now and then 2 to go.

[Ivy]

4 hats down, 1 to go, and they're put away. My problem was that a crochet pattern said the yarn needed to be thinner with an "F" hook. I decided since my yarn was thicker, I'd just go ahead and use a "G" hook! What a big hat head! So I "fixed" this by decreasing every row, it turned out wonderful and I fixed my goof, rather than tear out the entire hat.

Now I have 1 hat to make and 1 afghan for the 17-month-old and 1 afghan for the 3 1/2 year old. Beyond that, I've got a couple of cute hat patterns to do for them. 1 is panda helmets.

I made a Christmas folder to hold all my crochet patterns, even though I still have the Holiday Grand Plan binder, too. I wanted patterns in 1 place and easily accessible to.

How are others doing on their Christmas crafts preparation? Just wondering if anyone's crocheting, knitting, quilting or sewing for Christmas yet?

[blessedw2]

Great job on crafting ladies!!!

dh and I have put money aside for tips, list is complete,

next goal: write slowly names on white labels for christmas cards.

[Harriet]

blessed, when I want my handwriting to be at its best I reserve the chore for the morning hours when I'm not tired.

Ivy, you are really stocking your gift closet. Yes, I do at least have hope. I have 3 ornament mini-quilt tops complete, about 3.5" x 3.5", that I hope I can edge, batt, back and sew by Christmas. In a way, the "tops" were the hard part as they are paper-pieced, but getting to the rest will be difficult. I have a hard time finding a chance to get away and sew.

[blessedw2]

smart dharriet!

[ellyphant]

Happy to report I addressed Christmas cards today! Will sign them and write notes inside some of them closer to December. I only send about 25. With FB, I could probably just do an online greeting, but that's no fun! This is a task I enjoy--especially picking out just the right card for each person/family on the list. Rarely do I send one type of card to everyone.

Good luck to all of you. I haven't thought about gifts, yet, so you're way ahead of me.

[Harmony]

Ivy, that's a lot of gifts you're making.

I'm making quilts for all my DGSs that are here in this state. That's 5. I am just about done with the 3rd one. 4 are Twin size (for bunk beds) and 1 is double bed size. I have the bigger one done, did that one first.

I got a couple little things extra to give a couple of the kids..but at this point I am just thinking, thinking.

[blessedw2]

great job elly on getting fronts of christmas cards written!
how sweet that you make quilts for dgrdsons harmony!