I have been sketching, carving and stamping up a storm, gradually reducing this stamp until I was happy with it.

Every Christmas I think, this is the year I'll start sending Christmas cards again. I used to be so dilligent, posting them out to my university friends as  I went home to my parents each summer, sending little notes and baubles to friends as they travelled around the world.  Somehow it all fell by the wayside when I had children, but this year it really will happen.  The international ones went out a month ago and I'm gradually getting together the less urgent, local ones.

Such fun!
The Yellow Owl Workshop Carve a Stamp kit was birthday present earlier in the year.  You can get yours from The Village Art Shop, they are ever so friendly.

The Christmas count down started early in our house. To be precise it started the morning after Halloween. I woke to find two little girls at the breakfast table, felt pens in had and a long list of 'How do you spell...?'

The lists sat on our fridge until last week. We didn't want to bother Santa before December. H and I folded them up and posted them to the North Pole.  New Zealand Post runs an annual Postbag to Santa.  You can read more about it here.  You can even Email him.  We are waiting in anticipation for our return letters.

Sometimes projects are just an angels breath from completion.  These little pegs had been sitting painted for a while, waiting for wings, skirts and faces.  I imagined skirts made from slices of lightly coloured vintage embroidery and paper doily wings.  Consulting my drawers of damaged, vintage embroidery, I found other ideas. 

A hand embroidered table cloth, too long in the napisan was waiting for me.  It had been so long bleached that the thread work and hems were dissolving, but still not long enough to remove whatever the tenacious stain had been.  The white on white details remind me of feathers and so wings they were.  The tattered edges became an underskirt for each modest angel, with just the smallest whisper of cotton lace over the top.  My very own mini host of mini angels.