In training for Xmas

This drawer is an indication of my dilemma. It's overflowing with my Thimbleberries scraps. It's the top drawer of my cutting table, and I struggle to close it! I'm sure it wasn't this bad last week, but I haven't purchased any fabric, so what's going on?? I took it out yesterday and decided to spend an hour cutting up some scraps to go toward the Double Irish Chain blocks, and also to put into some of the other Thimbleberries scrap bins. (Yes, I have my T/B fabrics isolated from all the others, I don't think they play nicely with the others *kidding*) Well, that hour didn't seem to make a dent at all!

This is when it hit me, I have been sewing quite a bit this month, and I can't see too much reduction in my stash at all after a month long fabric diet! I'm thinking I will need to have another month of fabric fasting, not this month tho, Cheryl from Quiltaholics has got in some white Osnaburg for me. I've been hanging to find some, cuz it's wonderful to go with feedsacks! The weave is that little bit coarser and looks that little bit more genuinely old. But back to the stash, I seriously have enough scraps to last me forever, and I don't have such a huge stash as some people I know. Either I'm going to have to really ramp up the production (and I can't see that happening) or I'm going to need to review my spending habits.

This picture is what the title of this post is all about. We're firmly into the second part of the year now, so I'm starting to think about the Xmas gifts I would like to make for people, so I decided to do a test run on some placemats yesterday.

Now, I didn't come up with this design all by myself. I know I've seen something like this somewhere, but I don't know where. You know when you look at so many magazines, so many books, and see so much on the internet, sometimes it all becomes a bit of a blur. Well, that's what's happened. I know I've seen something like it, but without a pattern I've put my own maths into them.

I have these cute charm templates, and I'd been making the braid up using the templates and got bored with it, so I thought I'd cut it up and use it with these placemats. Some time ago I purchased a couple of yards of the Daisy Days fabric, and I really like it, so I put them to use to make up these practice placemats. I made up four, and just need to sew down the binding on the other three. I tell myself that these are for us to use, but I may yet give them to my Mum for her birthday later this month. Or ... I'll make some more ... cuz they're kinda cute ... :-)