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It's Day 25 of my Christmas Countdown - and it's Christmas Day.  Merry Christmas to everyone, and I hope you have a lovely day with family and friends.

December 2018

I'm spending Christmas Day at home in Wellington this year, with my husband, two sons, and my parents.   

I've enjoyed bringing you my 2022 Christmas Countdown.  It was fun to look back at some of the things I've made over the years.  Maybe I'll do it again in another five years in 2027.  I wonder what I will have made by then!

December 2014

I ...

Day 24 of my Christmas Countdown and it's Christmas Eve.  It's time to bring out my Gingerbread Flower Shop.

the front

the back

Yes, I've finally finished the last cottage in Victoria Sampler's Gingerbread Village. The cross stitching was straight forward, but I was hesitant to do the fancy stitches and the silk ribbon work. 

But I got there, and I'm very happy with the result.  Once again I embroidered my name and the date on the base so people can remember who made these cottages in years to come. 

I'm sad that this ...

 Day 23 of my Christmas Countdown and it's my "Oh! Christmas Tree" quilt designed by Wendy Williams.  

I loved choosing all the bright colours for this quilt, and then ...

Day 22 of my Christmas Countdown and it's my Gingerbread Etui.

I'll be featuring all the other houses from my Gingerbread Village in my 2022 Christmas Countdown, but you can also read more about my Gingerbread Village in the tab at the top of my blog.

Day 21 of my Christmas Countdown and it's my Flocks by Night quilt - pattern by Wendy Williams.

Day 20 of my Christmas Countdown and it's the Retreat Cottage from the Gingerbread Village.  

I love the thought of stitchers having their retreat in this log cabin covered in snow.  

I'll be featuring all the other houses from my Gingerbread Village in my 2022 Christmas Countdown, but you can also read more about my Gingerbread Village ...

It's Day 19 of my Christmas Countdown and it's The Candy Man quilt.

A few weeks ago I blogged about a spur of the moment Christmas quilt I had started.  Well, now it's finished and all ready to be used this Christmas. 

The pattern (Watling Street) was designed by Sheila Christensen and is in her book, Quilts with an Angle.  I made my quilt smaller because I only had a limited number of scrappy Christmas fabrics in my stash.  Can you believe I made a whole quilt from stash? Even the backing and the binding? Well I ...

 Day 18 of my 2022 Christmas Countdown and it's my Gingerbread Quilt Shop.

I do love how Thea has made this shop so appealing to quilters.  The sewing machine mounted above the door way, the beautiful quilts depicted on the sides and back of the shop, and the ladies sitting upstairs above the front door actually quilting! It's all so special and I loved making it.  

Day 17 of my 2022 Christmas Countdown and it's my Mill Hill Santas.  

I have five finished Santas now.  I do recall saying that I would continue making these Mill Hill Santas rather than joining the Prairie Schooler Santa train, but somehow I weakened and I've now made two Prairie Schooler Santas too! 

Day 16 and it's my Celtic Snow cross stitch designed by Northern Expressions Needlework.

There's a few factors that make this piece sing:

Day 15 of my 2022 Christmas Countdown and it's my Beaded Angels.

This ornament is very special to me because it was tricky to make. I went to classes at Nancy's Stitch Studio and learnt how to do beading.  The beads are threaded together with very fine Nymo thread which is extra strong nylon thread. The way they nest in to each other is called Peyote stitch - frequently used by North American Indians.  

To make this ornament we made the same angel six times, and then did some fancy magic stuff at the top to join them all ...

Day 14 of my 2022 Christmas Countdown and it's my Candy Cane Cottage.

This is another one of the cottages from the Victoria Sampler Gingerbread Village.  The candy canes are so cleverly designed, and once again, I love the decorative roof. 

There's little bit of hardanger on the windows, but the pattern explains clearly how to do it and it was quite straight forward. 

This is the smallest cottage in the Gingerbread Village and it was quite fiddly getting all those red and white beads place perfectly.  

I'll be featuring all the other houses from my Gingerbread ...

 Day 13 of my Christmas Countdown and it's my Holiday Patchwork Forest quilt. 

This quilt still makes me smile because it started out as just a few test blocks from scraps in my stash.  I didn't have an overall colour plan before I started, but I really like how it's turned out.  

I did some basic machine quilting on it, but then accentuated the trees with hand quilting. Both Kaffe Fassett borders were from my stash, and the thin red strip border adds a finishing Christmas touch. 

It's another small lap type quilt that I can ...

Day 12 of my Christmas Countdown and it's my third and final post on my Mill Hill beaded ornaments.  

Aren't they cute! My favourite is the gingerbread house (of course) but they're all cute.  They're quite quick to stitch, and easily finished by gluing a piece of felt on the back and trimming them.  I like to make a beaded hanger from the left over beads.  

I've still got a few kits in my stash, so there may be more in future years, but this is it for Christmas 2022.  

Day 11 and it's my Gingerbread Bakery designed by Victoria Sampler.  

I wish I could churn out sweet Christmas treats like these busy ladies do!

Day 10 and it's my Tula Pink Holiday Homies quilt.  

I made this cute quilt back in 2017 when Tula's Holiday Homies range was first released.

I didn't want to lose any of the motifs so I designed my own pattern which you can find here in my original blog post. 

Tula Pink has re-released Holiday Homes in flannel, but I was fortunate enough to get the original cotton version. 

Day 9 - A Treasured Time by Dimensions Gold Collection.

This scene is so different to Christmas in New Zealand.  We go to the beach at Christmas and have our summer holidays, but I've always loved these snowy Christmas scenes so I decided to stitch one for myself.  

Day 8 of my Christmas Countdown.

Here's some more of my Mill Hill beaded ornaments.  I do enjoy making these little kits.  They're quite cheap to buy (approx USD10) and everything you need is included - even the needles!

the purple one on the right is Diamond Holiday

Day 7 of my Christmas Countdown and it's time for another Gingerbread House.

This time it's my Gingerbread Church - the second building in the Victoria Sampler Gingerbread Village.  

I'll be featuring other houses from my Gingerbread Village in my ...

Day 6 of my Christmas Countdown.

These decorations are worked on canvas with thicker threads like Perle 5.  The designs are by Laura J Perin and they're called Holiday Ornaments Series #2.  (The page takes a while to load.)

I tend to just place these ornaments on the tree - they don't have hangers.