Tag: Handmade Christmas

Goodbye Halloween, Hello Christmas!

Leave a comment

It’s November, and right on schedule, it’s raining like crazy today. It’s pretty rain at this point—the brightness of the colorful leaves creates an impressionistic feel to the landscape, so at least we have that.

Top priorities this past week:

  • Halloween celebrating & traditions
  • Band Fundraiser Table Runners
  • Scheduling special musical performances for November
  • Finding a pianist for the Christmas program
  • Make some headway on the secret Christmas knitting
  • Rest when I’m tired or hurting

Celebrating

Halloween was fun this year. Not a lot of fuss, but Renaissance and I did manage to create our traditional chili in pumpkin bread bowls, which I wasn’t too sure was going to happen. She invited her friends over for another Halloween feast before Trick or Treating started, despite that they’re all adults now that don’t do Trick or Treating, and they hung out afterwards playing video games together and taking breaks to hunt down Rachel and Nathaniel in the neighborhood to jump scare them with light sabers. As one does…

I was a little sad going into Halloween this year because Ren and her friends have grown up and I was worried about Rachel and Nathaniel not having a group to go Trick or Treating with, but they put the word out that we live in a great neighborhood for Trick or Treating and some of their friends decided to come on over to do that here. It was nice. I love the chaos of having a gaggle of teenagers in my house on Halloween night. Absolutely love it—peak motherhood aspirations there.

So Halloween is over, and with that comes Christmas. I absolutely turned on Christmas music this morning as I worked in the craft room!

And spare me your “Christmas shouldn’t start before Thanksgiving” sentiments: I’m Canadian; I grew up with Thanksgiving taking place in early October, so my internal Christmas countdown was programmed in childhood to start once Halloween was over and I’m not going to reset it ever because more time in Christmas Town is AWESOME. I take the requisite days off from Christmas prep to do a proper job on American Thanksgiving, and we are very grateful people who are capable of exuding a thankful attitude even while decorating for Christmas. I know, it may be shocking that such people exist, but we do! Everything is OK, gratitude will continue to exist in our home despite the appearance of red and green before Thanksgiving. If you’re a person who doesn’t do Christmas until after American Thanksgiving, cool. You do you. But do not come in here demanding that the only correct way to celebrate the holidays is how you do it. Because that is blatantly incorrect.

And further more, how do you think Christmas music happens? Do you think musicians wait until after American Thanksgiving to start practicing that stuff? Of course they don’t! Big preparations take time, and there is not a lot of time between American Thanksgiving and Christmas. Sorry/not sorry to pop your bubble on this concept, but many musicians start practicing their Christmas music in October, even September. I started planning and purchasing Christmas sheet music in August. That’s how Christmas music happens—that far in advance. Just be thankful (hey, there’s that gratitude word!) that there are people who want to shower others with so much Christmas cheer that they’ll voluntarily give up their time very early on in order to prepare for Christmas, rather than pointing fingers and snidely alluding that the Early Christmas Cheer people are materialistic gimme pigs. We’re actually spending more time in service to others by getting the Christmas Town Express going early, and that’s…decidedly unmaterialistic, right?

/soapbox (I’m so tired of this argument that, really, shouldn’t even exist.)

Creating

I have found time to start working on the Band Fundraiser table runners this week. I’ve got most of the fabric cut up and I’ve ironed what I have on-hand and have done the first round of sewing on one (1) table runner. I hope the future organizers of this event don’t get tired of the table runners and get rid of them in a few years. They’re turning out quite nice and could potentially last for years if they’re treated well.

I made a little bit of progress on the secret Christmas knitting, too.

Community

I am hitting some major walls with church music. I shall remain optimistic through this weekend and if things don’t sort themselves out I’m going to have to alter my plans. Once again, but for a different crowd this time, how do you think Christmas music happens? A big part of that is people being willing to be a part of church choir. If you’ve ever wondered about joining your church’s choir, stop wondering and just do it. We’re desperate for you. DESPERATE.

Healing

I’m almost there, I can feel it. I yo-yo back and forth between overdoing it and needing to take time to rest from the overdoing, which is always a good sign that points towards a “nearing full recovery” kind of thing. I’m glad I wrote about it this time around so I can look back and see the glacial pace and know that it’s completely normal. Six weeks of inactivity is a really long time. You don’t think it is when people throw that timeline around, but laying around for that long is mind-numbingly boring. I guess I should be thankful that I’m feeling like bursting my prison right as Christmas Season begins. What a glorious reward!

Highlights

  • Halloween was noisy and fun. I love hosting all these kids at our house.
  • I made a beautiful pumpkin soup this week that was so delicious.
  • The best idea came to me at church: At the end of each month, sit down with your spouse and schedule all your weekly date nights for the entire next month. So simple, but it’s literally never occurred to me. When I approached Michael with the idea, he improved it by saying we could align our four dates each month with the four goal-setting areas of the Church’s youth program in order to expand our horizons a little more. So, a date night dedicated to 1) Spiritual, 2) Intellectual, 3) Physical, and 4) Social pursuits each month. In months with five Fridays we’ll have a family date, which are the most expensive dates of them all, but you know, kids deserve some fun times out with their parents, too.

Lowlights

  • Renaissance got her car stuck in the mud when she went out with friends to a haunted house this last week. Thankfully, Michael came to her rescue. Where would we be without good dads?

Feral Choir Concert Toddler

2 Comments

Seeing how I posted my goals for the week on Wednesday, the chance that I’d make significant progress on them was small. It’s just been such a busy week, and with needing to still rest when I start feeling tired I just don’t have a lot of time for the extra things. It’s a frustrating place to find oneself, but nothing terrible will happen as a result. I would just like to be able to do all the things, is that too much to ask?! 😉

Top priorities this past week:

  • Processing the garden harvest
  • Ward Choir logistics
  • Band Booster everythings
  • Walks
  • Secret Christmas knitting

Caring

Rachel had her first choir concert of the year on Tuesday and it was really lovely. I love seeing how much kids can do after only a handful of weeks into the school year. Even the freshman choir sounded great!

.

Unfortunately, the family that sat behind us at the concert had a free-range toddler who pulled out some of my hair, and when I turned towards whatever the heck had yanked hair out of my scalp the offender wetly sneezed directly onto my eyeballs.

Zero stars. Would not recommend. It got even worse later on when the toddler tripped and smashed its face into the back of my seat and screamed their anguish into my ear. I was very glad when the concert finally ended and I got to go home.

.

Nathaniel had his last cross country meet today and he did SO GOOD. He placed TENTH in his race with a time of 20:00.0. He wanted a 19-minute-anything time so badly, but alas…ha ha ha. Considering that he ran his first race of the season with a time of 23:03.0, I think he can safely be pleased with his progress over the season.

.

Garden

I think all we managed to work on after all the work at the beginning of the week was to get the last pumpkin roasted and pureed. I did go to the store and purchase ingredients to make Green Tomato Mincemeat, but the excursion made my incisions hurt, so I decided to rest a bit before continuing with my plans. Unfortunately, I started feeling crummy that evening, and I woke up Friday morning feeling awful and ended up sleeping most of the day away. I think I was fighting off whatever the Choir Toddler sneezed into my face. I needed to do a bunch of other stuff today, so I still haven’t gotten to the mincemeat.

Community

.

The church Halloween party was last night and Rachel and Renaissance helped out with the face painting. Renaissance also took over getting our van ready for trunk or treating once it became obvious that I would not be attending the party due to feeling so yucky, and she did a delightful job!

.

Ward Choir logistics were dealt with this week and we’ll have sheet music to sing from tomorrow as long as I remember to make copies in the morning. I also ordered all of the Christmas sheet music and expect it to arrive next week, and I could cry over how much it all cost, but if I can get everyone I want to help out with the Christmas program it will be amazing. I am very excited about the possibilities.

I did not get to Band Booster stuff, but it’s high on my list of priorities for next week. The fabric for the table runners should arrive Tuesday afternoon, so I guess I’ll start sewing up table runners on Wednesday or Thursday. (Boring! But needed.)

Health

I went on zero walks this week. Between getting over the cold from last week and dealing with the Choir Toddler flash illness this week I just haven’t had the energy to do much more than some halfhearted office-y work from the couch. I’m doing my best, folks.

Healing from my surgeries is feeling good. One of my incisions is healing a little slower than it should so I have to do some extra care for that three times a day, but it looks like it’s working and the wound is finally closing up. Grocery shopping really tired me out on Wednesday, so I’m still working towards having more energy. It’ll come back.

Creativity

.

I worked on my not-secret knitting for a little while before Rachel’s choir concert. Emily and I went on a little yarn crawl together in July and I saw a skein of self-striping yarn in perfect Christmas colors and I had to have it. I’m making some adorable Christmas socks for myself from it and adding in solid red heels and toes because it’s perfect. I’m almost done with knitting up the heel flap of the first sock. I love that you can take the downtime of daily life (like waiting for a concert to begin) and use it to get further along on a project, rather than wasting that time looking at a phone. More crafting in public is needed! Join the cause!

I didn’t work on anything else due to the aforementioned ickiness that prevailed all week. I’m falling so far behind! Fingers crossed for a healthy new week!

Highlights

  • When Nathaniel came running over the crest of the hill before the finish line in his race, way before I expected to see him.
  • The huge smile on Rachel’s face when we handed her the bouquet of flowers after her choir concert.
  • How cute the van looked after Renaissance finished decorating it for the Halloween party.
  • Emily brought me Panda Express for lunch one day as she came home from running errands because she thought I’d like it.

Lowlights

  • The Feral Choir Concert Toddler :::squinty side-eye:::
  • Two illnesses in one week

Despite all the illnesses, I AM getting stronger and feeling better each week, so that’s good. Michael and I both are really excited for how much better I could potentially feel in my daily life once I get all healed up. Ugh, the amount of pain and lost days I’ve had to deal with for the past ten years is gobsmacking. And it could just be over now. Maybe. That’s incredibly exciting. We shall see…

I’ll leave you with a photo that Nathaniel texted me while he was out on a run this week. I may not be getting out a lot to enjoy this beautiful autumn weather, but my kids send me pretty pictures of it, for which I’m grateful. There’s always happy little glimmers to make one smile…

FINISHED: Building Block Socks

2 Comments

They’re so finished that he’s even worn them to church already.

Details:

Pattern: #216 Beginner’s Lightweight Socks, by Diane Soucy of Knitting Pure & Simple (my favorite sock pattern!)

Yarn: Knit Picks Felici Fingering Weight in “Building Blocks” colorway (colorway discontinued), 2 skeins with very little leftover.

Needles: US 0 (2.0 mm)

Modifications: I used the wrong needle size somehow. It should have been a US 2 (2.75 mm).

These were supposed to be done in time for Christmas, so I had to enact the “public shaming” method of pressure to get myself to work through to the end despite missing my original deadline. I will say that this method definitely works for me.

I did use the wrong needle size somehow. The last pair of socks that I made for him, I didn’t write down what size needles I used, and just looked at the picture of them to guess what needles they were and then hunted down a similar-looking set and got knitting. I think I may have a set of gold-colored US 2s and a set of gold-colored US 0s, and…there you go, mistake made. As a result, these are a dense fabric and a little on the snug side, but he says they work well in his church shoes, which are a snug fit, as most church shoes are.

He likes that they’re bold and peppy. I wasn’t expecting that. He’s more of a “dark, monochrome colors” for his socks kind of guy. I was trying to use up stash and I’d had this yarn since 2013.

Progress: Building Block Socks, and Notes on How Long it Takes to Knit a Pair of Socks

1 Comment

Getting close to the end of these, which is good because I may or may not have fallen prey to a yarn store-closing sale that is now shipping seven new skeins of sock yarn to me as we speak…sorry/notsorry.

As I’ve been knitting on these, my brain keeps trying to make me feel bad about how far behind I am on these, and it occurred to me that I might have a faulty sense of how long it actually takes to knit a pair of socks, thereby dooming myself to always feeling like a failure whenever I knit a pair of socks. As it stands, it feels very comfortable to knit a stripe’s worth of yarn each day on these, and so I counted up the stripes in the completed sock, and it’s 23 stripes. That’s a little over three weeks’ worth of knitting at a comfortable pace. Multiply that by two (because two socks in a pair) and you get 46 days, which equals 6.5 weeks to make a pair of socks for Michael.

In my head…I thought it took four weeks. So of course I always feel like I’m behind when I’m knitting socks for him. It’s good to figure out the numbers on stuff, because numbers generally don’t lie, and I like knowing exactly how things are going to go and numbers are the way to figure that stuff out. It takes seven weeks to knit up a pair of socks for Michael. No wonder I can never finish the “started in December” pairs I always try to make for Christmas. This timetable has been noted in my Christmas preparation notes.

Nereid Mitts Update

4 Comments

Yeah. They’re finished. And it never would have happened this fast if I wasn’t publicly shaming myself to get through them. Blogging is awesome.

I hope they bring you joy, Denise.

It’s so funny to read through other people’s write-ups of this pattern. Not many like it. It’s not a bad pattern at all, it’s just finicky and brain-consuming, and a lot of knitters knit in order to zen out. This is not a “zen out” pattern at all.

I’m also worried that they may have turned out a tad small. Which would be highly annoying, seeing that it took me almost ten years to make them.

Details:

Pattern: Nereid Fingerless Gloves, by Denise Sutherland (Ravelry link)

Yarn: madelinetosh Tosh Sock, “Flashdance” colorway

Needles: US 1 (2.25mm)

Modifications: Not on purpose…ha ha ha

Click here to see this project’s Ravelry page.

Finished: Peacock Feathers Stole

2 Comments

The first time I blogged about the Peacock Feathers Stole was September 9, 2009. Twelve years ago. That’s how long this project has been taking up real estate on my internal “works-in-progress” list. I’ve been carrying this project around in the back of mind for longer than my youngest child has been breathing oxygen in the real world. I kept restarting and abandoning it due to a million different reasons, and it was only after three failed attempts that this stole finally began to actually exist as an actual tangible creation, when I cast on for the fourth attempt in the summer of 2014. I finally finished it up over this past summer, and then, unbelievably, kept it a secret until giving it to my granny for Christmas this year. You guys, the maturity…apparently I have that now.

As much as I complain about how long this took me to make, it’s been great fun to go back and read through all the posts about this project throughout its creation because they took place at the most random times and managed to really capture some of the major milestones of my life in the past twelve years: Morning sickness while I was pregnant with Nathaniel, packing for Australia, being in Australia, back surgery, moving to Washington, stuck at home during the summer we thought the pandemic would be over…it hit a lot of the major notes.

And now it’s complete, blocked, and gifted. It sure feels good to check this one off the list.

I hope my granny gets good use out of it. Sure, there’s not a lot of opportunity to wear special clothes out and about these days, but hopefully those kinds of days and events are right around the corner and she gets to strut her stuff soon.

The Details:
Pattern: Peacock Feathers Stole, by Dorothy Siemens, formerly of Fiddlesticks Knitting. It looks like she’s retired from knitting design, so the original website is gone and you have to purchase the pattern through Ravelry.

Yarn: JaggerSpun Zephyr Wool-Silk 2/18, “Juniper” color, 2 cones

Needles: US 3 (3.25mm) 24-inch circulars. I want to say they’re Addi Lace Turbos. They’re gold-colored, and I’m assuming made from brass because they had that brassy “tang” of a smell to them whenever I’d start using them again after a hiatus. The sharper tips were very, very useful for all the stitch manipulation in this pattern.

Modifications: None.

Click here to view this project’s Ravelry page.

Finished: Patchwork Forest Quilt

2 Comments

It is so weird to finish up this surge of Christmas quilts these past few weeks because it’s requiring me to go back and re-read the posts I wrote about them when I started them, and wow. So much has gone on, especially since I started working on the Patchwork Forest Quilt in the autumn of 2019. I randomly decided to jump on the quilt along bandwagon that Amy put on that year, and it was a great experience that I immensely enjoyed. It was a sweeter time: My niece had just been born, I was homeschooling Nathaniel, things had finally settled down after the move up here…it felt like we were really getting ready to live “happily ever after” during that autumn.

I keep talking about this quilt as “the one I made before COVID,” which is weird because there were a couple of other finishes before COVID really got its wheels turning, but this quilt feels like the last one I made before things started getting stressful with keeping an eye on the development of the COVID situation, so in my mind it’s just from “before.”

I had originally planned to big-stitch hand quilt it, but ended up hating the actual work of it and ripped out the hand quilting after a week’s progress. Then Christmas was over and I set it aside to bring back out when Christmas 2020 got closer so I could finish it then…

But I don’t think I had the desire at any point during 2020 to pick it back up to finish for Christmas. Last Christmas is just a fogged-up murmuring in my memory. When I had the thought to maybe try to finish it this year, I almost cried: The desire, ambition, drive in my heart was finally back. We got through Hell and came out on the other side and some things are still relatively the same. When my drive to finish projects dried up towards the end of last year, I knew I was stressed and anxious beyond my max and to leave the crafty side of things alone and just focus on surviving. I’ve been through that particular cycle enough times in my life to know that it’s a temporary adaptation to stressful situations, and I allow it to run its course, knowing that the fabric and the yarn will wait for me to come back. The fabric and the yarn don’t judge. Thank the stars for that.

This quilt is twin-sized (~72″ x 90″), and Renaissance has claimed it temporarily for her bed until I make her requested Christmas quilt. (The plan is to do that in 2022.)

Details:

Pattern: Patchwork Forest Quilt, Pine Hollow version, by Amy Smart of Diary of a Quilter.

Fabric: I used lots of well-loved Christmas scraps, random half-yard purchases, and forgotten Christmas fat quarter bundles for this quilt and had so much fun with the color palette. I absolutely love this quilt. A friend of mine called it the “Hipster Christmas Trees” quilt, and the name stuck; I actually have to go and look up my previous posts to remember what its real name is when I write about it.

Backing: A lovely, thick black and white plaid Mammoth flannel, #SRKF-16943-1 WHITE. This quilt is heavy. It’s amazing.

Quilting: I went beefy with the quilting thread, using Aurifil 12 wt in the top and Aurifil 40 wt in the bobbin, color 2021. I eyeballed straight lines about 2.5 inches apart, and I love the slightly wonky unevenness of the quilting because it matches the slight wonkiness of the tree blocks. I also used black Auriful 12 wt to quilt the black inner border, and then returned to the white Auriful 12 wt to quilt a few lines in the blue outer border. (Note to self: Straight line quilting only with this thread; the machine did NOT want to do a serpentine stitch AT ALL…)

Binding: I decided to do a scrappy binding because 1) I couldn’t decide which fabric to choose for the binding, 2) I don’t think I had enough of anything to do a full binding, and 3) The more wonkiness, the better on this quilt. It was an extension of the fun to randomly piece together the scraps into binding while I watched “A Christmas Story” earlier this week!

Dates: I pieced this in October and November of 2019, and quilted it in December of 2021.

We were busy making epic amounts of Christmas cookies on the day I took pictures of this, and I left it hanging on the couch afterwards. Renaissance was a cookie-making machine; she baked from 8am until 5pm and was absolutely exhausted come dinner. She decided to go to bed at 7:30, happened to see the quilt on the couch as she headed to her room, and wordlessly scooped it up before trudging up the stairs. When we checked on her later, she was out beneath her new quilt, hopefully dreaming sweet Christmas dreams.

Why, Hello, Week of Christmas

Leave a comment

Good morning, lovelies! How was your week last week? I’m so glad I took a little break from the online world, it was definitely needed to get things somewhat put back together ’round these parts.

Is it me or does it seem like the blogging community is waking up a bit these days? It seems like no one has blogged in years, and suddenly there’s all of these “coming out of hibernation” posts popping up and oh my goodness, it makes me so happy! My heart loves blogging, first and foremost. Instagram is great and all, but reading through people’s thoughts and decision processes, accompanied by good photography…that is my jam. Give me thought-out content that’s worth my time, not some silly little reel stitched together in fifteen seconds.

My crafty thoughts for this week:

  • I’m really hoping to get the Patchwork Forest quilt done.
  • I don’t think Sew Many Stars will get finished this year, and that’s OK.
  • The “Fair Isle” knitting project won’t get even get started this year.
  • “Stripes” and “Pattern I Don’t Like” are more than halfway done each; I think I can only finish one before Christmas, and I’m paralyzed regarding which one to pick.
  • I am going to bake some Christmas cookies this year, darn it. I had a day set aside last week, but the Universe really conspired against it happening, and by the time I could finally embark upon said baking, I was way too tired to even start. I do have a whole day set aside this week to bake with the kids, though…fingers crossed!
  • I had THE BEST IDEA while I was laying around in my sick bed this month, and I’m excited to share it with you later this week!

I hope you have a fantastic week, friends. Opt for the more restful options and just enjoy this season without taking on the things that stress you out. You’re amazing and strong, and I hope you find some beautiful crafty time to fill your soul.

Finished: Yuletide Botanica Orange Peel Quilt

1 Comment

Another Christmas quilt is complete! I’m really excited for this beautiful project to be out and usable!

The details:
Pattern: Orange Peel Quilt from Missouri Star Quilt Company
When I received this fabric from Blank Quilting last year, I didn’t want to cut it up too much because the prints were gorgeous, and, lucky me, I had picked up a MSQC Orange Peel template for 10″ squares from the freebie table at my last quilt guild meeting, so I decided to go forward with a super-sized orange peel quilt.
Fabric Collection: “Yuletide Botanica,” by Camelia’s Creation Studio for Blank Quilting, sent to me during my ambassador days in April/May 2020.
Background Fabric: A green with white polka dot print from American Jane’s “Bread ‘n Butter” collection, #21697-19. (Some of you may remember that I made a baby quilt from that collection a few years ago, and a tiny scrap of it was on the floor of my craft room when I received the Yuletide Botanica collection. I picked up the polka dot scrap and set it on the cutting table, and noticed that it paired nicely with the Yuletide Botanica collection. So I did some online shopping and got more. What a complete freak accident of happy circumstances.)
Backing Fabric: A green and white gingham flannel whose selvage disappeared somewhere. This quilt lived on on the TV room couch for a few days and every kid made a beeline for it because they love, love, love the flannel on the back. I’ve been informed that all future quilts should absolutely be backed with flannel.
Quilting: Aurifil 28wt & 50wt in color #2000 “Sand.” I quilted all the straight block lines, and then straight diagonal lines through the centers of the orange peels/footballs. It bugs me that I’m not doing more quilting, but my husband was using the last quilt I finished and he commented that he liked it better than most of my quilts because it was “floppy and not as stiff as the other quilts.” Sooo…I guess it’s fine?
Dates: I pieced this during May of 2020, and quilted/finished it in November 2021.

A funny note about this quilt that is totally a symptom of its times: The pattern has you use interfacing for constructing the orange peels/footballs, and I used medium-ish weight interfacing in this quilt, and realized I’d need to use a heavier weight quilting thread to make sure the quilting could withstand the extra weight of the beefier interfacing. After a few days of mentally berating Past Cara for choosing to go with the heavier interfacing and all the potential problems it could now cause, I finally remembered why I went with the heavier interfacing: I couldn’t find sheer or lightweight interfacing because it was sold out everywhere because people were making masks with it.

I’m making sure to note on quilt labels if they were made during Quarantine, because my historian heart adores facts like that. (I basically make quilt labels for my great grandchildren to read someday.)

This quilt will live on Em’s bed during the holiday season, and seeing how they’re graduating high school this spring, it will welcome them home from college for Christmas Break over the next few years, and that just makes my mother’s heart ache a bit. Hopefully it will be soothing sight.

Finished: Fresh Cut Pines Quilt

5 Comments

You guys, I finished a thing! Like, completely finished it all on my own! I made a plan to finish a thing and it WORKED. No crazy injury to derail the plans, no pie-in-the-sky wishful scheduling that was impossible to maintain…just realistic, practical planning and showing up to do the work and it made me actually finish a thing. That is a big freakin’ deal to me because finishing things has not been something I’ve excelled at for the past year.

And it’s a Christmas quilt! For my kid! And he loves it! And it’s for Christmas! I love Christmas quilts! I finished a Christmas thing!

The details:
Pattern: “Fresh Cut Pines” from the book, Winter Wonderland, by Sherri Falls of This and That Patterns.
Fabric Collection: “December Magic,” by Emma Leach for Blank Quilting (from my brand ambassador days), paired with some random greens from my stash.
Background Fabric: “Fog” Bella Solids by Moda
Backing Fabric: A fantastic one-inch red buffalo plaid 108″ wide backing made by Windham Fabrics, Style #51462
Quilting: Aurifil 40 wt in Natural White in the needle, and Aurifil 40 wt Red in the bobbin. I quilted straight vertical lines, 2.5″ apart. I now wish I’d done a little more, but I was nervous about quilting my first twin-size quilt and wanted to keep it super simple.
Dates: I pieced this during May & June of 2020 and quilted it this November.

I’ve mentioned before that it is my dream to someday have a Christmas quilt on every bed in my house during the holiday season, and this is the first such quilt towards making that dream a reality. I am extremely, extremely pleased with its completion!