The Third Stocking

We are now officially a three-stocking family! Madeline's stocking is now finished, and I am so happy. I picked up the part with her name on it yesterday, and I finished piecing it together this afternoon.

I copy-catted a Pottery Barn Kids design when I made her stocking, and I made it out of red corduroy.

This is the reason that having a unique, hand-made stocking for each family member is such a big deal for me:

When Daniel and I were dating in college, I started this cross-stitch stocking for him. We started dating our freshman year and knew pretty quickly that we wanted to get married. We had to wait a LONG time (3 1/2 years to be exact) until we finally graduated and were able to wed. That gave me ample time to work on the thousands of stitches in this crazy-intricate design.

I knew that there was no way that I could create such a time-consuming stocking for myself, so I decided that I would make each family member's stocking completely unique, with no attempt to make them match at all. So after we got married I made this stocking for myself:

I pieced together patchwork of several red and green fabrics to make this one. The hardest was attaching the tiny gold beads that I used to write my name at the top. ( They don't show up very well in this photo.)

I am already planning the design for Little Brother's stocking for next year.... :)