Christmas Gifts

This year I decided to tackle home made Christmas gifts.  I had a whole bunch in mind.  I was planning on making ALL of M & G's presents.  I ended up not having enough time to make all that I wanted to.  I waited a tad too long before beginning.  

I made all of my boys Christmas pj pants.  Daddy, M, G & L.  I was hoping to make myself a pair but apparently my Hubs isn't a tiny guy.  I thought I bought enough fabric for the both of us... not so!  I had JUST enough for him.  It was ok though, I got a pair from Old Navy for $4 and they coordinated with Hubs perfectly.  They were white with red HO HO HO all over them.  The pants were wrapped for Christmas Eve.  The boys watched me make them and knew what they were but they were so psyched to get them.   When they first opened them they said, "just clothes".  Hubs said, "WOW we got Christmas pjs.  Mommy made them special for us."  They shrilled in delight.  Can you say warm fuzzy heart. :)  Thanks Hubs :) 

The biggest project of all was the car map back pack.  I found it on Pinterest and followed it to here.  I'm not a great crafter or sewer.  I don't have much of an imagination when it comes to this stuff (or anything for that matter haha).  I might have an idea of something I want to do, but then I search to see if anyone has done it before.  Maybe it's the easy way out.  When I came across the car mat backpack I was thrilled.  Then I saw that there was no tutorial for it.  

BUMMER!  Then I looked at it some more.  How hard could it be?  Let's just try.  So I made 6!  Geeze, that's right 6!  One for M & G each and then for our four nephews that I thought might appreciate it.  I started with one.  I figured if I could get the first one right I would be able to do an assembly line with the rest of the 5.  

I think I have enough pictures (not very good ones) to put up a mini tutorial of how I did this.  

I zipped up the backpacks threw in a wooden car and cinched it closed.

After the backpacks were all done I made some hair accessories for my nieces and the cousins gift exchange.

The blue clip went to my oldest niece.  The heart band went to her little sister.  The purple flower went to another niece and the white one when to the cousin exchange.  The hair accessories tutorial can be found at one of my favorite blogs deliacreates.

I also made an ear warmer for the cousin exchange.  I really want to make myself one!  I think it is sooo awesome.  This can be found at deliacreates too.  She has so many different fun things to do with the ear warmer.  I can't wait to make myself one.  I will probably never wear it but I want it non the less.

Hubs brother and wife had their 5th baby 7 days before Christmas.  I made her a cute little outfit.  Honestly I wanted to hold onto it, but who knows if I'll ever have a girl.

The tutorial for the skirt can be found at another one of my favorite sewing craft go to blogs made.  I can't stand how the elastic looks on this.  I didn't have the exact same grey color thread as I did elastic.  I also sewed too high on the elastic that it was flipping funny so I had to sew a second line.  I had already ripped out half of the skirt once I didn't want to do it again so two lines were staying.  Not sure why I was so silly, I've made this skirt a few other times for other people.  O'well.  It's cute non the less.

I dyed the onsie blue.  I had these rosettes already made.  When I was pregnant with L and we didn't know if he was going to be a she or a he I went a little girl crazy and started practicing my girl crafts :)  Since I have a baggie full of rosettes I just utilized what I had.  I never finished twisting the white ribbon one so I scrunched it across the onsie and loved it.  I will definitely be replicating this one if I ever have a girl.  

I didn't think the hair accessories were enough for our nieces.  I'm sure they were, but I wanted to do a little bit more.  I made little hobby horses.  I found them here.  Mine are no where near as cute, but they work.  I went to Walmart for the socks and they didn't have white ones left, the craft store didn't have light pink boas, the dollar store didn't have fake eyelashes, and I only had medium googely eyes.  I think they are cute anyway.  

I had extra little flowers made from the clips and hair bands so I decided to put them in the horses mane.  

I have a feeling I will be making manly ones for M & G's birthday.  

Talk about HOT PINK!!

I also made a book for our youngest nephew.  I came across it here.  She has a great tutorial for it.  I was so thrilled with myself, I didn't actually have to read her tutorial.  That could have been because she had awesome pictures, or maybe because I'm getting better at all these sewing crafts I'm doing.  

After I cut out all of the pieces, ironed them on, and then secured them by sewing around them I realized that I have my own awesome little nugget at home that would like it too.  When I make multiple of things (which is more often than not since I have twins) I like to do them at the same time.  I left this book in pages hoping I could get one done for L but those backpacks just took so long.  I never did make one for L.  I had to sew this up just a few days before Christmas and it was the first project I had ready to be done.  

I think the kids gifts came out pretty great.  I'm happy with them.  

Sadly we weren't there when all the kids opened their gifts.  :(  It was pretty hard for me.  I spent all nap times, bed times, and some wake times where I put on some movies just to get these done.  I felt like I was missing out on time with my boys and I didn't even get to see the nieces and nephews reactions.  

Unfortunately M & G were sick over Christmas.  They had high fevers the week before and were wheezing.  We had to give them their inhalers.  Ever since they were little and had RSV several times in their first winter now they always get bronchitis to almost pneuma type of symptoms and since the newest member of the extended family was only 7 days I didn't think it was right to bring my boys over.  I didn't want to be the one to get a new baby sick.  

I was happy when I received some picture texts.  One of my sister in laws tried to take pictures for me of the kids opening their gifts.  

I'm taking a little break from crafting but have a good list of things that I want to get done soon.  At least there is no time line for them :)