Hi there. I'm Nicole Gilbert and you've joined the stop scrolling start sewing podcast. Are you new to sewing and want to start quilting but have no idea where to begin? Each Wednesday? Join me as I share the ins and outs of that quote life. If you don't have a sewing machine, have no idea how much fabric theory or you're just trying to figure out where the heck to stick that bobbin from this is the podcast for you. Hey folks, Nicole here. Welcome to Episode 58 of the stop scrolling start sowing podcast, and it is back to school season. Can I get an amen from all the moms out there, but more importantly, should I also call it Christmas sowing season. Before we dive in, I just wanted to drop a quick reminder that our podcasts thrives on reviews by amazing listeners like you. positive reviews allow my podcast to reach more new listeners, which in turn allows me to create more and more episodes. So head on over to wherever you listen to podcasts, and leave a review today. Okay, guys, let's get sewing. So, Christmas sewing. If you've listened to previous episodes of the podcast, in particular episode 26, you can find that over at Nicole Gilbert colts.com slash Episode 26. You heard me talk about planning for holiday gift giving. It's actually quite a big topic in the sewing community. So many of us love to give gifts with our quilts. However, it takes a lot of time. And when we're gift giving for Christmas, we have to kind of like reverse engineer when we should actually start sewing to make sure that everything's done by the time we're going to see our intended recipients. Now, this isn't today, instead of talking about all the amazing holiday gift giving, however, because been there done that, let's talk about all of the holiday quilting that you're going to want to do for yourself. And we all have like mental like beautiful Christmas quilts in our head. But that's not necessarily what we're talking about. I mean, we're going to talk about it a little because Come on, it's cool thing. But let's talk about all of the things and all of the ideas. I know that over the years, I sometimes have felt stuck and be like Man, I wish I had decorated for more for Christmas. And there is kind of a limiting factor for us. Being a military family, a lot of times our time to go and visit family ends up being over the Christmas holiday. And there's not much point in decorating your house for Christmas, if you're going to leave on the 10th of December and not come home till January. So there have been many years where we just kind of skip it all together or we do a refund. Just a couple of little you know trinkets around the house but nothing huge. Now that my kids are getting older however, I like to spend Christmas at home and then visit friends and families after the holiday. And so decorating has become a bigger part of the holiday season for me. And I have been like racking my brain of all the things that I can make because I like all of my stuff to be a little bit cool too. Because that's me You know, that's it's my jam guys kind of why I'm here. So I have kind of over the years haunted impact all of my favorite things to make up for holiday decor. And so today that's what we're going to chat about. Okay. who've sold let's get in into it. First up, table runners. Now the wonderful thing about christmas decor and it really depends on you and your personal aesthetic. I am not a person who is like overtly Christmassy, like I like christmas decor. But if I'm being 100% honest, it's not straight up christmas decor. When I say that it's because I'm not including snowmen and Santa Clauses there's not a lot of like really overt Christmasy things. I have you know, silver reindeer, and I have you know, a solid silver nativity set. And I you know I decorate with for Christmas without being too overt. I mean a nativity set is a nativity set. I'll give you that one. But other things are more like candles that are you know, silver, I use more silver and more glittered and it's just a little bit more warm and cozy, there's more candlelight. That's how I decorate for Christmas. Personally, all of the ideas that I'm going to give you, I'm going to give you the version that I make. And also know that there are more versions that do include snowmen and Christmas trees in Santa Claus, and menorah as in all of those things. It's just my personal taste. So keep that in mind, just like everything else. With quilting. It's about your personal taste. So back to where I started, which was table runners. What I love about table runners is you can do pretty much any pattern. Like any table runner, you pattern you find on the internet, you can do it and make it Christmassy. You can either choose reds and greens and whites for your fabric tones and they don't have to be Christmas prints, they can just be predominantly those prints and when you put them together, it's going to look Christmassy I promise you that. Just remember to stay true to your tones when we're choosing our fabrics. So you can do brights. If you're going to a bright green, choose a bright red. If you're going to do a muted foresty Green, choose more of a maroon or brick red, you know keep keep in line with our tones just to make it fluid when we pick a bright green and an Maroon red and we kind of mix up those tones. That's when they start to not look Christmassy. But as long as your green and your red are from the same family. They've got like the same level of brightness or muted ness, they'll look Christmassy, I promise you. Okay, so that's number one. Number two, if you're not into overt Christmas, but you want like a winter holiday feel, go with silvers and whites and blues that immediately gives you that winterfield. Also, that works well for those of us who would let rather celebrate Hanukkah than Christmas. So it really there's the sky's the limit. But I just listed four different ways that you can make the exact same pattern and make it fit your style of holiday decor. So that's number one with the table runners. And also, there are so many patterns out there. Especially foundation paper piece patterns. Christmas is great for foundation paper piece, because you can make Santa Clauses and snowmen. And you can do it really easily if you foundation paper piece. So keep that in mind. So that's table runners. Next up is Christmas tree skirts. And actually, I'm planning on making a new Christmas tree skirt this year. My previous Christmas tree skirt I made about seven or eight years ago. So it's it's definitely time for a refresher. Now my last Christmas tree skirt, I have a themed Christmas tree sort of I used to have a super themed Christmas tree. Then I had kids who came home with a bunch of ornaments and now I have like a 5050 like you could tell what my theme was. But now there's a lot of like homemade ornaments and stuff on there. So it's kind of 5050 at this point. But I like a muted Christmas tree skirt. So my Christmas research that I currently have which I'm planning on replacing is actually whites and creams and really, really subdued you'd have to look closely to realize that the the tone on tone print is Christmas ornaments and Christmas trees. So it's there but it's almost like a Where's Waldo kind of a thing. It's very neutral. I haven't decided what I'm going to do for the new one I think I might just go all out Christmassy and just bite the bullet and understand my kids are little and Christmases about them especially the Christmas tree and go full on Christmas but um that's that's to be determined. I'm going to put a pin in that one and you guys can just follow me over on Instagram to see how I actually work that one out. But Christmas she's our crease skirts are great one they're also really fast to make because a lot of the Christmas tree skirt patterns are going to strip piece meaning you're going to sew together a lot of like jelly roll size strips to then cut them up and create your skirt which is great. Because it's it's really fast to get together so it's super satisfying. My next project is the lap quilt. I mean, do we are doing that all love to cuddle on the couch. I don't know about you but starting Thanksgiving when they play sound of music on on TV. All the way through watching a Christmas story over and over and over again on Christmas Day, like cuddling on the couch is my jam during Christmas, have a fire going? Warm popcorn, some chocolate chip cookies, things are good. So obviously, we need a quilt. And I think for a lot of people, a Christmas themed quilt is probably the first thing they think of when they are planning on doing quilted home decor. I will say though, a lot of these other projects on the list are so much faster. And because of that, they could be more satisfying. So I'm not saying don't start with your quilt, whatever, whatever you guys want to do. Go for it. However, if you're looking to do several of these projects this year, to really put a little bit of a personal stamp on your holiday decor. I suggest some of the smaller projects first. And then you can have fun, I like to do my Christmas quilts in July. Just to bring back that holiday feeling. So let's see. I would say definitely a one. Ooh, you know what is a great and I'm like bouncing all over the place cuz I'm getting so excited because like Christmas and quilting. It's like oh my gosh. But my I am currently doing a block of the month with Mota and it's called my favorite colors moda and its features moda Bella solids, so it's all solid. There's no prints in it at all. I am doing the tropical getaway series. However, there is a quote kit out there called tin cookie. So instead of tropical getaway it's Tim cookie, but it is my favorite color is moda. And it's a Christmas quilt. And it's so cool because this quilt is really stinking cool. It's a sampler quilt. It's got like every classic block you can think of and some modern blocks all mixed up. And they're all various sizes. It's really stinking cool guys. And I got to say I got the tropical getaway. I'm obsessed with the tropical getaway and I'm so happy I chose it. I wish I had also gotten the cookie tin and I might have to hunt down and buy it anyway. So I'm gonna throw that up there. Christmas ornaments. So this one is a little bit of a cheater. So you don't actually so the I mean there are definitely Christmas ornaments that you can sew. However, the ones that I'm thinking of are your classic ball shape, and they've got these triangular pieces of fabric wrapped around them and they're absolutely beautiful. I made a ton of these last year I actually made there they take like maybe 20 minutes to make one. It's really great to know so option you just need Flathead pins and fabric and styrofoam balls I believe my styrofoam balls that I got were three inch styrofoam balls. And what I actually did was I use them as the main tags on presence that I gave out to family members. So everybody got this Christmas ornament. And it was pretty simple. So Christmas ornaments are great ones stockings are a great one. I made our stockings A while back and I'm super happy with how they came out. And I'll probably keep those stockings for quite some time. My son has been eyeballing this a light up one Hobby Lobby which kids man they're really cramping my decor style. But I might I might have to give into those but the handmade stocking will make a comeback when they are old enough to not really care about how I decorated their stockings. Mug rugs McGruder great, they're like coasters, but a little bit bigger. And they're like little mini quilts. Which is great for those of you who want to do a quilt, but really want some satisfaction of getting it done soon. Make some mug rugs. They're great little hostess gifts. They're super easy to make at you don't even really bind them you satin stitch the edges. So that's really great. I mean, you can bind them but now we're talking about pretty small binding. So I don't personally suggest it. But they're great to make. I love mug rugs because again, quilts couch, something warm to drink. It's just it's all good. It's all Christmas. I like to think of Christmas or the holiday season in general. More from like the feelings I get. I don't really associate it with like, I mean obviously Santa Claus is the thing. We are huge Christmas morning people here and I love getting and giving gifts Not gonna lie. However, when I Think of the holiday season I think more about like hot chocolate and coffee and cinnamon buns and popcorn and movies and the fireplace going all of those things. So I tend to lean towards those places being where I concentrate my decor efforts. So a mug rug is also great because obviously coffee and hot chocolate. Another thing that leads well is throw pillow covers, so you could make great throw pillow covers, and they can also be like blocks of a quilts that you then isolate and make into just a throw pillow cover. You can get pillow forms at all of your major retailers, Joanne's Hobby Lobby Michaels, also to keep in mind is sometimes just go to Walmart and go to their like dorm decor, you know, like the same kind of area of furniture that Walmart also sells like the clear plastic drawers like what would you put in a dorm room, that level of like home decor that they've got, they usually have throw pillows for like $5. So sometimes, getting the finished throw pillow from Walmart is actually less expensive than getting a pillow form from a craft retailer. So keep that in mind. Sometimes let's work smarter, not harder, guys. And lastly, and I'm just blowing through these because I'm so excited. I planned on being like so calm and so organized. But you guys know me that went immediately out the door as soon as I got excited about the topic wallhangings. So wallhangings are another way that you can do a quilts in a more easily manageable size. And then you can put it up on your wall and have it be its own like you know centerpiece display. I tend to like to go with blocks that like one block wonder kind of things that end up being like 36 by 36 or 40 by 40. And I tend to like things that kind of remind me of like barn quilts. That's my thing. I have barn quilts in my home because I've obsessed with them. But having a quilted representation of a barn quilt it's it's so meta. It's hilarious to me if I really think about it, but it's really stinking cool, guys. Okay, guys, so I have been rambling and rambling and rambling. And I hope that you have gotten some ideas. And in between all of that great holiday sewing that you're doing for your friends and family. I hope you at least pick one or two of these items today and make a little something for yourself. You will enjoy it. Alright guys, thank you so much. You have finished another episode of the stop scrolling start sewing packs podcast. Thank you so much for hanging out with me. Make sure you never miss an episode by hitting subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts. Now stop scrolling and start selling