needle and thREAD

Happy Feast of St. Nicholas!

My husband had foot surgery last Wednesday and he's been at home recuperating all week so my days are running together and I can hardly tell it's Thursday.  Thankfully, I did a rushed bit of sewing and can join needle and thREAD again today over at In the Heart of My Home.  Link-ups are such good fun!

This week, I dove into this matryoshka fabric and made some little mini plush dolls.

Now that I've discovered that I can make little stuffed creations out of any fabric print, I'm all about it.  

The process is very simple, though I didn't take a picture of the sewing part.  Basically, you find a backing fabric, sew around the outline of the figure, and leave a small opening to turn your doll right side out and stuff it.  Then you hand sew the opening shut.  Just like making a bean bag with stuffing instead of beans, ya know? 

Love the final result!  Not so much the making part.  Mini dollies are a bit time-consuming.  Even with small fingers, I consider stuffing them quite the accomplishment.  And I like to stuff them nice and sturdy -- which makes sewing them shut also an accomplishment.

In case you are wondering, they are about 2 inches tall.  You know what else would be fun to do with fabric like this?  Put ribbon loops into the top seam to make sweet ornaments.  Can't you see a  tabletop tree covered with matryoshka?

I'm starting to look at fabric now with the thought that I can use the images on the fabric for their own sake.  I might just take some cutouts from this fabric and have my little girls glue them to felt to make more kid-friendly ornaments for our tree.  Maybe add some sequins, too.  I do have a soft spot for sequins.  Now if only I could remember where I hid them last year to keep small people out of them...

As far as reading goes, I have been out of town this past weekend on retreat which gave me a lot of food for thought but not much time to read (I had a certain 10-month-old with me for a large portion of the retreat which does put a damper on sitting still to absorb words on pages -- or absorb anything else, for that matter!).  The retreat was about renewal and re-commitment to Jesus and it whet my appetite to spend some time reading Porta Fidei (the letter by Pope Benedict XVI on "The Year of Faith") in preparation for Christmas.  These December days are already flying by and there is no time to waste, so I need to get to it, now don't I?!  Maybe next week, I'll be back here and can talk more about it.

That's all from me today.  Head on over to this week's needle and thREAD for more great stuff.

Hope you are having fun with your own projects and that your preparations for Christmas are full of peace and joy and anticipation!  

~  Liz