Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Christmas Stockings

I am thinking about Christmas stockings tonight.

These are our stockings of Christmas past. The knitted one is mine from childhood. My brother's stocking is a similar pattern. I am very partial to this knitted stocking because Santa was able stuff that puppy to the gills. My dad's stocking is a large wool sock. My mom's stocking is a vintage felt stocking her aunt brought back from Germany. One year my mother's whole family gathered for Christmas at our house and my mom made everyone reproductions of those wool stockings. It was a true labor of love.

Stockings are one of my favorite traditions. I like the clever little presents as much as regular gifts-probably even more now that I contribute to their filling.

Cliff's family has stockings, but they are only really used for decoration. They no longer fill them. My cousin's kids do not celebrate with Santa, so they use their stockings as part of a fun family tradition. At some point during the day mom or dad sneaks a small surprise in their stocking for the kids to discover. I imagine that as they grow older, they will begin to leave treats for each other as well.

This year my family is coming to LA for Christmas. It will be my first Christmas as hostess. We have traveled every year for the past 6 years, so I am pretty excited about staying home. To mark the occasion I wanted to make some new Christmas stockings so that each guest would have one. I have been trolling Flickr in search of some inspiration and as you can imagine, there is plenty. Here are some I starred in my Flickr favorites.

I have kicked around the idea of using felted sweaters. I have a few sweaters thrifted with that idea in mind. On the other hand, matching stockings would be nice too. I have plenty of that red and cream buffalo check form the futon to shoe bench project. Or maybe some redwork?

How about you? Do your stockings match? Are they homemade? Do you have any special stocking traditions?







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6 comments:

Meg said...

I grew up with the stocking tradition--I learned that sometimes the best things were stuffed all the way down in the toe! We usually had store-bought stockings. I'm not aware of any story behind them--probably just stockings that my mom liked.

Once I had kids, I wanted to make stockings for them and personalize them with cross-stitch or something. It never happened. A few years ago, I finally shelled out to Pottery Barn Kids for personalized stockings. They were expensive, but those will be their stockings...forever! My only beef with our house is that there's no mantle over our fireplace, so I hang the stockings from our bannister. A little untraditional, but it's their first stop on the way to the tree on Christmas morning.

How fun for you to be hosting the holiday this year! I hope you have an enjoyable time!

ChesterAndDonkey said...

I was just thinking the other day, I would like to host Thanksgiving but I definitely like to go home for Christmas! Stockings were always a big part of our Holiday. I love it that you can put the little things in stockings, like you said. Oh, and I have to open my stocking first before the big presents!

And I love your idea of making some from thrifted sweaters ... I think that would look great!

HollyLynne said...

We're staying home this year too! HOORAY!!! :) We're splitting the festivities up though, so while I'll be doing xmas dinner we won't be opening presents at our house. So no stockings here (which is good I guess because our fireplace only goes out about 1/2 an inch from the wall. Marble slab. Meh.)
You're going to have SO MUCH FUN getting your place ready for the holidays!

Tara said...

Last year I made our stockings. I made our daughter's out of some pink, black and white polka dotted fabric (pink is her favorite color). Mine is a Amy Butler fabric that is brown with pink and green (green is my favorite color) designs. Our names were monogrammed onto them. My husband's is my favorite. He's in the Army so I made his out of a surplus Army Combat Uniform (ACU) top. I had his name stitched onto a nametape and I sewed it on. I pinned his rank and branch insignia on and sewed all of his unit patches on. I love it.

Wendy @ Ramblings from the Sunshine State said...

I have been thinking about Christmas as well. I have been trying to get things here and there, and need to get some gingerbread ornament dough mixed up.

We all have different stockings. I cant seem to find any that I love that are big enough, I've gotten 2 so far trying to find one for my DD. Ive got the baby to find one for this year.

jodi said...

Maybe the stockings could be designed to go with the personalities of the individuals.