Blue Christmas

The dance studio has a Christmas tree all decked out in blue and white (blue is our school color, I think perhaps in honor of St. Patrick, and also because it's the traditional color of Irish royalty). We've all been invited to donate ornaments. We always say what a cool idea that is, to donate ornaments, perhaps handmade, and then promptly forget the tree exists as soon as we walk out the studio door.

The other evening I dropped off AnnaBeth for a class and then headed straight to Hobby Lobby to buy some stuff to make Christmas cards. And, of course, I wandered over to the yarn and thread aisle because that's the part of the store that I ALWAYS gravitate towards, and I had more time to kill before I needed to get back to the studio.

And discovered that they now carry really luscious, thick wool felt. And all manner of Clover needle felting accessories, like these clever needle felting applique molds.

And I really, really, really wanted to play around with these goodies. Aha! How about buying some blue felt and making a Christmas ornament for the studio tree? Wouldn't that be a good excuse?

Yes!

I got the snowflake applique mold and some of that awesomely thick wool felt. I don't own the swanky Clover needle felting tool -- I just have some very utilitarian needles purchased back before this craft got so popular -- or the swanky Clover mat -- just some old foam we've been using for needle felting for years and years. As you may suspect, the mold worked fine with what I had on hand:



So I stitched the edges together with some DMC Perle Cotton I had (why do I own a bunch of DMC Perle Cotton? It's been hanging around for years, and I don't really remember why I got it, but I knew it was in the bin with the needlepoint canvas and the embroidery hoops).



And found a bit of white ribbon from a bag of partially completed angels someone gave me (yes, I'm a popular drop off spot for half completed crafts -- go figure).



Our next hurdle will be actually remembering to take it to the dance studio and hang it on the tree. Gosh, I'd hate to forget to do that and have it hanging around here -- what a shame that would be, you know, having a cute little mitten ornament hanging on our tree ....