Kiwi Crafters Unite for Christmas!

I've started getting some decorations in the post from the Kiwi Crafting Christmas Decoration swap run by Twenty Cent Mixture - I'll put photos up of the ones received once they've all come in. Everyone has such cool ideas - I'm fearful mine is looking a bit fuddy-duddy now.

I decided to go with a kiwi theme and use a kowhai flower design. I really enjoyed the chain-stitching and it was relatively easy to trace the pattern onto the fabric. I think the key was using a simple shape and then infilling it with colour. I added 2 little red glass beads for the stema/stoma/stamen - end bit of flower (!).

While I tried to recycle as much as I could out of my big stash of craft resources (nice piece of raw linen, thrifted embroidery threads, beads from an old necklace), I did end up buying some new ribbon in the local haberdashery (I love that word - HA-BER-DASH-ERY - it reminds me of the Flintstones and Johnny Depp in costume). It's french ribbon and I liked the peace doves on it as the Mumbai attacks had just occurred when I was looking.

So the end result isn't quite what I envisaged - I think it was the stuffing in the end. I had thought of filling it with mixed spice or cinnamon bark - but less time, lesser time and no time left meant standard filler was added and it's ended up puffier than I hoped for.

Well done all you kiwi crafters who participated and thanks to Twenty Cent Mixture for organising it so well!