The Big Reveal: Christmas Presents!

Yay!! I'm so tired of keeping this secret. It's been killing me. Ok, slight exaggeration, but it has been annoying. Well, now the secret is out! We had our family Christmas tonight, so now I can share what I've been working on!

This year, as I've been hinting, implying, or outrightly stating, I've been working on really hard & very time consuming Christmas presents for my family. And I'll be honest. I didn't get them all done like I planned, but I did get 7 of 11 (or 12) done!

For the last couple of years, as a family, we've exchanged names and just did presents for one person each (which was my idea). Well...I found these last year and really wanted to make them, so I decided to ignore our new-ish tradition.

When we were kids, my Auntie Liz made us each an adorable stocking that we used our for entire childhoods. Well, now we're all adults and our stockings are old, so I thought new ones might be in order, especially since people keep getting added to our family! And because I can never do anything small or simply, I thought it would be fun to make Monica and her family stockings too.

The stocking kits are from Bucilla. They are felt stockings and everything is hand stitched. The only machine sewed part is the lining that I put inside the stockings and that is hand stitched to the stocking. Hopefully I stitched everything together well enough that these will last a long time. :) Oh, and I do have to give credit to Cait, she did pay for half of them as a joint Christmas present from both of us. :)

So, without further adieu, here they are!

Monica's (which took me three months alone):

Stephen's (Monica's husband):

Jesse's (Monica's son):

 All together now:

Mom's:

Erin's:

Nana's: (I have to give credit when it's due. Caitlin was a big help and actually made Nana's stocking all by herself. Thanks, sis!!)

Steven's (my personal fav!): This stocking is why I wanted to make everyone stockings. I saw this online and KNEW Steven NEEDED this in his life. It may or may not have anything to do with the fact that Steven has a alter-ego (one of several--including Napoleon: Seriously.So.Funny.) that is called "Pirate Steve" so naturally he needed a Pirate Santa stocking. :)

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And here are the ones I'm going to make this next year, hopefully by next Christmas (I'm crossing my fingers):

Caitlin's:

Nick's:

Rachel's & Mine (we'll have matching ones--Cait's choice, not mine. :)) :

Oh, and I *might* have to make another one, depending on if/*coughwhencough* a certain baby sister of mine gets hitched. ;) Oh, wait, that WILL happen, so now I need to find a fun one for Jim....hmmm.........