Friday after Thanksgiving is a fun day. Most years, I do not leave the house that day as it is the time to put the 1947 version of Miracle on 34th Street on the DVD player, take down all the autumn decorations and begin to put up Christmas. Of course, this weekend begins the shopping frenzy for those with gifts to buy. I miss that as the family has stopped doing gift exchanges, so I only need to shop for My Sweet Babboo and his 101 year old mom. In recent years, we’ve gotten her things she can eat for the most part – scones mixes, box of candy, specialty coffee and the like. I like those things too, nothing more to store or dust, LOL!! Today, if you need some ideas for gifts, I’ll show you a bunch of my free tutorials for quick sewing. To start my holiday decorating, I’ll put out some cute things in the sewing room for festive cheer. A small tree on my antique Singer treadle sits on a Flying Geese Table Runner that I made last year with a portion of a panel.
I was happy to be a part of the launch of a new pattern from Fat Quarter Shop last summer. The pattern is called Starry Charms and uses charm packs with background fabric. This is Holiday Flourish by Robert Kaufman fabrics. I paired it with a golden Bella Solid from Moda. See my post on Starry Charms Christmas Quilt for full details. It is a table topper size, and it will be auctioned off at our annual MINI club’s Silent Auction at our Christmas weekend. The proceeds this year will benefit the Haywood County Flood Relief Fund, to help those who lost so much in the spring flooding earlier this year.
Christmas cookies will be on the agenda this week, to take to some gatherings. These make nice hostess gifts, too. Here I have my tray from last year, and I’ll make some of these again. My recipes for Chocolate Covered Oreos, Cranberry Eggnog Biscotti and Christmas Vanilla Sugar Cookies are on previous posts with step by step tutorials and downloadable recipes.
Now, for some gift ideas for quick and easy sewing to make for your friends and family. All these are linked to the free tutorials right here on my blog. Do you have a quilter on your gift list? This Sewing Kit is easy to make, has no hand sewing, and can be used for jewelry too! The link has a full tutorial.
Sew a quick, four block table topper from my post last year. Tree Bell Table Topper.
Make a Christmas Nine Patch Star runner. Or do it in other colors for every day use.
And one more design for you, my original runner design from a Christmas Quilt Along in 2015. I reworked it into a single post with a pdf download for Christmas In July last year.
Giving Gifts From The Kitchen comes from the heart. This post has my Double Dutch Chocolate Brownie mix recipe with a downloadable pdf of the recipe, along with a few more, and printable gift tags. It also has a recipe for grilling herb and spice mix for the guys.
A wool penny rug is quick to finish, and this Christmas one is my original design. See the post for the free pdf pattern – Christmas Wool Applique.
From my Autumn Jubilee event, this Tablet Cover is versatile and great for anyone who has a tablet. Made up in black and grey would be wonderful for guys, just use your favorite 8-inch block, or follow the directions for this one.
Small Christmas stitchery projects can be made into ornaments with just a bit of sewing time. If you don’t have handwork to frame like this, use your embroidery machine to stitch out some Christmas motifs. See my post on Christmas Stitchery with Ideas for Finishing for more ways to make ornaments from your handwork or machine embroidery.
If you can do letters with your machine, words make wonderful ornaments too, like these Christmas Ornaments. Plus there are more ideas for crafty ornaments on that post, using cookie cutters and more.
One last idea, my Christmas Hexagonal Table Topper free pattern is on this post – Christmas Hexagonal Table Topper.
Wouldn’t it be nice to have some holiday music while you sew your Christmas decor and gifts? Check out this wonderful New Age Jazz Christmas music cd. Light Jazz really is my favorite genre of music. This one is a wonderful collection from the Windam Hill artist group – A Jazz Noel. It is available on Apple Music and Amazon streaming too.
See my post Happy Thanksgiving for links to all the great deals this weekend.
Are you beginning your holiday decorating and baking? Are you ready to start some Christmas or Holiday sewing? Do you make your holiday gifts?
From My Carolina Home 
Your MIL is 101, that is amazing! I used to love shopping the day after Thanksgiving, but not anymore. I have completed most of my decorating with only a few things left to finish! Happy Sunday, Carole!
I’m trusting you had a very pleasant Thanksgiving and enjoyed feasting like most of us did. Our family doesn’t exchange gifts anymore and either except for seeking out gifts the grandkids don’t already have I’ve been able to avoid the shopping frenzy.
Great ideas! Jazz Noel is one of my favorite cds. Yeah, I can stream music, but when you’ve already got something, including a vinyl 33-1/3 lp & turntable, might as well use them. I was going to make a wreath using 2-1/2″ squares only to find my box of Christmas scraps was more sparse than I remembered. I managed 9 log cabin blocks for a different style that worked out fine. Starry Charms is beautiful, such rich colors.
Hope you had a lovely TG, Carole! We will be heading into Christmas decorating later this week,after spending the holiday with our kids and grands in Raleigh. Sooo much fun!! We usually start with the outside: wreath, lanternsand greens in the planters and sometimes light-up angels in the yard, if the ground isn’t frozen yet. Then inside, the Christmas quilts come out, then a few decorations and the tree is usually the last thing up shortly before Christmas; that is a tradition from years past when the kids were home: If the tree was up, the kids expected presents under it immediately and many times I hadn’t finished shopping yet! I do love bringing out things collected from loved ones over the years. Fond memories of folks now gone. I have made several of the hexagonal table toppers and they are so quick and fun to make and always well received! I’m anxious to hear the Windham Hill Cd. We love smooth jazz, too!
We have had very nice weather these past two days, so I imagine lots of people got their outdoor decorations up. Always fun to drive around and see the lights. I think I’ll wait until my cleaning helper is finished Tuesday to start changing things inside, and maybe get more into the Christmas spirit. Your idea of playing some music or the movie is a good one! And when we pull some of the decorations out, no doubt that will help too. I enjoy using Christmassy towels in the kitchen. Thanks for the inspirations!! Fortunately I finished sewing some Christmas gifts in the summer…just need to package them up!
Christmas decorating is on deck for this week at our house. We had snow overnight so it is looking quite winter outside. I have to find my boots….
I love decorating but putting everything away at the end of the season, not so much! I love the little tree you have on your treadle machine. I like to make most of the gifts I give. I’m still in full production in that department! Have a great week!
I so enjoy your posts of hand made items that you share with us. I recently lost a old friend, 104, I loving called mother and she called me daughter. One year I made her a jacket from a white sweat shirt, just added trim down the middle, after cutting that area first. Around the bottom and then a patch on the right side for all to see, ERMA her name. She lived in it almost, played bingo games with it on, one thing she always enjoyed. We all miss her now in the Retirement Center.
Maybe you could make one for your mom this year to stay warm and feel loved.
That is really amazing to still have your MIL at 101! Sounds like you have great gift ideas for her. I enjoyed seeing your Christmas sewing ideas – I always like to be sewing something seasonal during the season, but don’t know what it will be yet. Enjoy your decorating!
My next door neighbor’s mom is 104 and still living in her own home with the help of her loving children watching over her and keeping her company. You’re so generous in sharing your time and talents with all of us. This vlog was especially cheerful to me. It will be difficult for me to even think about decorating around the house since everything is pretty much torn up while doing renovations after water damage. Much of my kitchenware is occupying the dining room and they haven’t begun the drywall repair yet. I’m (almost) confident all will be well by Christmas. Have a blessed Sunday.
Thank you for the many quick and easy projects to make. It is so kind of you to share these. Hope to try a couple of them. Absolutely love you antique Singer sewing machine Christmas tree and runner. It is beautiful.
So many wonderful thing to make. Our sewing for the kids group is celebrating the holidays on Wed. and I have to bring the cookies! These are perfect!!!!! So such to do! Thanks for all the reminders of the great Starry charms and the quilt along. Love them. Thanks.
At times like this, I wish I stitched or quilted because I love your patterns! I’ll bake for neighbors and also do some felties for a few. I used to knit sweaters for everyone back in the day. I’m with you on receiving. I don’t need things — give me something I can eat, read, paint with or an experience. I’m stopping exchanges with a couple of good friends (one, regretfully, but wisely) and with that one we are going to have “a day” where we go to a lovely lunch or dinner at someplace really lovely and have an experience — maybe a gallery or museum visit, depending on Covid. The time together matters most.
There’s always so many great idea on your blog!!! Wonderful that your MIL has made it to 101!
I’ve always enjoyed your ideas and comments and your generosity with projects. This morning everything Christmas related I read and studied is brightening my day. Thank you.