Christmas presents, part 3: Ornaments!

Ornaments and small detail work are things that I usually do right at my laptop, staring at the pattern and counting carefully, so they are in general not great projects to do with the kiddos around. I can cram them in during naps and when Dan's around, so I made use of our staycation to get a couple things made.

I already posted the first ornament that I made, the pink poinsettia. Unfortunately I put the petals on backwards so I'm just keeping that one for my family and making another the right way. I really like this post about mistakes in crafting. If I've already finished a project but I'm not happy with it, I tend to just keep it for myself or give it to someone who will love it, mistakes and all.

The second ornament I made this year was the red poinsettia. Pattern here.

Instead of making a bunch of the same ornament, this year I'm thinking I'll do a different one for each family. So I'll be making a snowman, a Christmas mouse, and possibly a Santa in addition to the flowers. Not planning to make them out of exactly the same yarns specified, since I already have a ton of acrylic yarn in all colors of the rainbow.

Here's a bit of my process with the snowman. First I stitch up all the pieces. For this pattern, there are only four--to contrast with those stupid poinsettias, which have 15 pieces each...each individual leaf, petal, and middle part was its own piece. You can see why I decided against making more of them. Here I have already stuffed the snowman's body with fiberfill.

Then I tuck in ends and do any surface embroidery. Here I also attached the pom-pom to the hat.

Then I assemble.

I should probably have just bought new plastic eyes. I had plenty at one point, but they seem to be "in a bin" and I haven't been able to locate them. This time I just made the eyes with black yarn instead. Confession: I suck at french knots. For the mouth, the pattern called for black yarn in a straight line, but on a second look at the picture, it looks like they used black thread instead to make a tiny grin. My snowman looks rather grumpy and not nearly as cute as theirs. Maybe I'll just call him Grumpy Gus and try harder with the others.