Christmas cards and presents - check

The cards are in the mail and the packages are enroute and I feel good! I even made a batch of cookies in time to include some in the packages. Whew! This year I was only able to make two gifts. I have many more handmade gifts in mind but in order to stay sane at this time of year (and get them shipped in time), I have to make some limits. It's hard because I'd love to make things for everyone. But I also need to sleep and go to work. Every year I vow to work on gifts throughout the year and I actually did start an intended Chrismas gift last spring. Unfortunately that was the only time I worked on it so it is not one of the two gifts this year.

I did finish my nephew's baseball-print flannel pants but I really think they will be too small for him. I wrapped them up anyway and enclosed a note with an offer to make him a pair that will fit (and in his choice of print in case he thinks the baseballs were loony).

I even finished shopping for my husband! Most of his gifts were à la Amazon.com but I did buy him a few other gifts when I was out shopping last week. I may venture out again and pick up a few small things to put in our stockings. We're going out at lunch today to buy my gift. Of course I would rather have been surprised by it on Christmas morning but there is no subtle hinting with him. He's too afraid of buying me the wrong thing - or worse, getting his feelings hurt by buying me something I don't like.

I guess technically my gift-sewing is not over. I want to make some catnip toys for the cats. I saw some toys at the pet store recently that made me want to run to the sewing machine. Imagine this if you can: take two pieces of felt, sandwich with small lump of catnip, stitch around said lump (preferably in the shape of rectangle, circle, fish, etc), trim with pinking shears. Or pay $3.49 at your local pet store. That is about the extent of it. I could glue wiggly eyes or felt shapes on the outside but they'd probably just get pulled off and eaten. I may make mine with corded tails since my cats love string. And they'd really like it if I used bright pink or red felt. It seems they respond best to those colors.

Now that the Christmas gifts and cards are done (again - YAY!), I may actually be able to make some of the Christmas decorations I never seem to get to. My "rule" for sewing/knitting/crafting at this time of year is to first make the presents that must be shipped, then make the presents that are local, and then work on decorations and stuff for me.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot, I still have to finish that baby blanket I started for my grand niece. And there is the faux fur throw that I was going to make for my husband and started but never finished. It's boxed up somewhere. And there are more cookies I must make. I have a tradition of making the cookies of my childhood and some of them are rather labor intensive. Call me crazy.

There will be pictures of the aforementioned gifts. I just have to download the pics off the camera and get them on the internet.

I started knitting another kitty bed. It's the perfect TV-watching, multi-tasking project. I'm almost half-way through already! Pictures of the first one are also on the camera. At least two of our cats really like it. The one cat gets very jealous if he catches the other cat sleeping in his bed.