Christmas 2012

I wanted to post about Christmas. Recently my crocheting has been centered around Christmas. I have been making Christmas stockings, ice skate ornaments, mitten ornaments, angels, reindeer ornaments, pot holders and polar bears.
The Christmas stockings are 3 styles, a larger one with a mitten pocket sewn on the side, and 2 smaller styles that are simple, plain, but still festive.
The pot holders are just that, pot holders in red, green and white.
The reindeer and polar bears are fun little amigurumi ornaments, to make them more 'christmasy' for lack of a better word, I put little scarves on them.
The ice skates and the angels seem to be the most popular at the craft show. The ice skates ornaments have paper clips for the blades, some have bows, some have fur embellishments. The angels are small and come in a rainbow of colors. I used white crochet thread and colored friendship bracelet thread to make these. The mitten ornaments are the same pattern that I used to make the pocket on the stocking, I just embellished them with sequins and snow flakes and attached them with a chain of yarn.
On Christmas eve and Christmas day, I handed out ice skate ornaments to both my family and my husbands family. I gave one to each household to put on their tree or wherever they would like it. They also make great decorations for your car. Hanging them on your rearview mirror decorates your vehicle nicely for the holidays.
As I continue to blog, and learn more, I would like to start posting photos of what I make. I will play around with that a little today.
The little ornaments, especially the ice skates, make great last minute tokens that you can carry in your purse and hand out to people as a small gesture of Christmas spirit.The mittens and angels work well for this also.
On Saturday, December 22, I set up at a craft show at the Mahoning Valley Nursing and Rehabilitation center. This was a wonderful event that the staff, Bernadette especially, put together so the residents who are less able to get out and about have an opportunity to interact with outside vendors. It was very nice to sit and talk with people as they came by the table and looked at the different crafts that were available that day. Many of the residents have the same interests in crafts that the vendors had and gave them an opportunity for them to offer their advice and experience. I think this is a wonderful idea and my hat goes off to them for providing this opportunity to both the residents and vendors. I was also able to meet other vendors and get some ideas for future craft shows.
I would like to take this opportunity to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a very happy and healthy New Year.