2022 Christmas Countdown - Mill Hill beaded ornaments (part 1)

Day 4 and it's time for my first set of Mill Hill beaded ornaments.

I love stitching these little ornaments.  It's a tradition now for mum to give me a new kit for Christmas and for me to stitch it between Christmas and New Year while watching cricket on TV.  

The perforated paper can be a challenge at first, but once you get used to it, it's fine.  Just don't pull the thread too tightly and rip the paper!

I glue felt on the back to finish the ornaments nicely, and I like to make beaded strings to hand them from because there's always lots of beads left over.  

2022 Christmas Countdown - Redwork Christmas

Day 3 of my Christmas Countdown and it's time for a Christmas Quilt.  

We don't need many quilts at Christmas time in New Zealand because it's summer, but I couldn't resist this Redwork Christmas pattern when I saw it advertised in a magazine.

This quilt was designed by Rosalie Quinlan more than 10 years ago, and I'm not sure if the pattern is still available.  But here's a link to some of her other designs which are similar.  Sadly Rosalie passed away from breast cancer which is such a pity because she was a wonderful designer. 

Here's some of my favourite blocks.

(the calico appears red/pink in these photos, but that's just the light shining through the red backing)

I received the patterns as a Block of the Month and enjoyed stitching each panel with red DMC embroidery thread.  

The quilting is minimal because I didn't want to quilt over the embroidery.  

See you tomorrow!

2022 Christmas Countdown - Gingerbread Stitching House

Yes, in case you missed Day 1 yesterday, I'm doing a Christmas Countdown and I'm going to show you a different handmade decoration each day of December until Christmas Day.  

Today it's my Gingerbread Stitching House.  

This was the first cottage that I made from the Gingerbread Village designed by Victoria Sampler.  I quickly became addicted to the Gingerbread Village and have now made almost all of the cottages.

I love the way that the stitches on the roof  look like icing.  It's almost good enough to eat. And the hardanger on the windows.

This stitching house was designed so the roof lifts off and you can store things inside. The area is very small though because the whole house is only 4" x 4". 

I like to record my name and the date on the base of my cottages, and this tells me I made this stitching house 10 years ago.  It seems fitting that I will finish the final house in the village series in December 2022.  

I'll be featuring 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.

Now it's time for the Peacock Party.  Feel free to link up a recent blog post below:

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

2022 Christmas Countdown - Little House Ornaments

Welcome to my 2022 Christmas Countdown.  

I've made a lot of special Christmas decorations over the years, so this year I've decided to do a Christmas Countdown and show you a different handmade decoration each day of December until Christmas Day.  It will be like opening a virtual advent calendar.  

I'm going to publish my daily December posts at 8pm New Zealand Daylight Savings Time (like I normally do with my weekly blog posts). The beauty of blogging is that the posts will always be there to look back on.

First up - some little house ornaments to hang on my tree. 

As you can see, these little houses were quite fiddly to make.  There's tiny beads, backstitches and lots of colour changes.  But they are so cute.  

I made these ornaments 10 years ago in 2012.  Back when I had more time on my hands than I do now!

I used the Victoria Sampler "Little House Ornaments" pattern and I love that they are all different colours.

Victoria Sampler patterns always include great finishing instructions with plenty of photos, so don't be intimidated if you want to give them a try.