On the 12th day of Christmas, here is the rest of my 2013 Christmas crafting!

I've always wanted to craft an advent calendar, but none of the patterns I ever saw quite fit the bill. It had to be sewn for long term durability. The numbered pockets had to be of sufficient size, and scattered throughout so you have to hunt for the appropriate number each day (that is part of the fun IMO). It had to be sparkly and colorful, playful but not cutesy. I finally saw this panel by Henley Studio for Makower UK at Fabric.com on sale for ~$5! It has metallic gold accents throughout and a fun design. Of course you still have to buy backing and batting, but the overall cost is quite reasonable and this is an easy project, completed in two evenings. Pithy directions are printed on the panel, but you can find more detailed instructions online at Makoweruk.com.

My finished calendar is 20" wide by 27.5" tall. The pockets are just big enough for a Ghiradelli chocolate square. If I wanted to put multiple items in each, I might try Dove promises. I used my walking foot to put it all together, successfully for the first time. What do you know, reading the directions (or watching online tutorial) can help. Slowing the machine speed down below medium is critical, at least for my machine. It's a Brother CS 8072. Great all purpose machine that can work for quilting- it accommodates a walking foot and the feed dogs can drop for free motion quilting- but quilting is not its forte.

The back has a sleeve, though which you can stick a narrow wood dowel; tie a cord or ribbon to each side of the dowel to create a hanger. However, once I hung it up in my kitchen, the whole thing got a bit distorted. It doesn't have enough body without some additional quilting/tying. So, next year I plan to quilt around the border and tie at inconspicuous places throughout; I don't want visible quiliting all over it.

I made three stuffed 9" tall, 6-sided trees as centerpiece / table decor, following this excellent tutorial by The Sewing Directory. I only had one type of fabric so my trees are the same on all sides. Each tree requires a lot of polyfill and my three trees required almost a yard of fabric. Because of how the pattern is cut on the fold, you can't cut half the trees facing up and half facing down, and there is significant wastage. Of course, you could mirror image the pattern and cut it flat, half up and half down. That would save fabric, but require twice as much cutting.

Though it's not part of the tutorial, I embellished the points by sewing on beads and crystals, which I felt was needed to jazz up the trees. A spot of hot glue was necessary to straighten the large bead at the top. It's an easy project, but handsewing on 19 beads per tree takes some time.

Here is my Christmas place setting. The runner, placemats, and napkins are the "Joyous Holiday" pattern; I picked it up at Bed Bath and Beyond last year. I beleive it's discontinued, but I called around and managed to pick up 4 more placemats and napkins this year. With the baby on the way and my dining table which seats 8 or 10, I like to have 8 place settings. The red beaded chargers are from BB&B; they are quite reasonable at $10 for a box of 6. The dishes are the Pfaltzgraff Winterberry pattern, which I began collecting around 10 years ago. I'm not a huge fan of stoneware (I prefer porcelein; my everyday dishes are Mikasa Antique White) but I've never seen another Christmas pattern I like as much as Winterberry.

The napkin rings are crafted by moi. I cut 1" sections off a paper towel core (gentle sawing with an exacto knife works well for this). Then I cut 2 x 6.5" rectangles of ivory jacquard fabric. I centered the fabric and secured around the cardboard ring with a spot of hot glue every 1/2 inch- folded the lenghtwise excess over the end for a narrow hem and glued over the beginning. Then I folded the widthwise excess to the inside of the ring on both sides and secured with hot glue every 1/4 inch. I hacked apart some fake fir and berries and hot glued at the base of each ring, over the ivory jaquard "seam". Then I hot glued a narrow cranberry ribbon around the base of each ring, covering up the attachment point of the foliage.

This isn't exactly a craft, but it's artistic I suppose. I made a Buche de Noel using recipes from several different sources. The icing and meringue mushrooms were from Saveur- the meringues were baked a day in advance and the icing creates a ton, but it is nice to have excess. The cake was from Real Simple (steps 1-4). My first attempt was tasty, but it did not roll... it stuck to the buttered parchment when I did the inititial roll up around a kitchen towel, and later when I unrolled it off the towel, the cake broke into sections. The second time, I melted down 1 tbs of butter and brushed it thoroughly all over the parchment pre-baking, and skipped the kitchen towel. I decided on a mocha cream filling- here's the recipe: Chill your mixing bowl and wire whisk. Sprinkle 1 tsp gelatin over 1/4 c cold water, let sit 5 minutes. Microwave 3 min, stirring after each minute, then let stand at room temp for 10 minutes until it is still liquid but no longer hot. Meanwhile, in your cold mixing bowl, whisk together 3 tbs sugar, 2 tbs cocoa, 1 tsp instant espresso powder, 2 tbs cold heavy cream, and 1/2 tsp vanilla extract. Add another 14 TBS cold heavy cream (the remainder of 1 c total heavy cream) and whip until mixer marks start to show. With mixer running, add the liquid gelatin in a slow, steady cream and continue whipping until you get stiff peaks. So, then spread the mocha cream over the cake, leaving a few inches uncovered at one short end. Start rolling up from the opposite short end, letting the parchment fall away. Slice a few inches off at one end, diagonally, to make a "stump". Transfer the log to a serving platter and secure the stump on top of the log with some icing. Melt 1/4 c of the icing and let it cool so it's still liquid but not hot. Spoon the liquid icing over the vertical stump, covering it completely. Apply the icing to the rest of the log using an offset spatula and run the tines of the fork all along the log to create texture. Decorate with the mushrooms. Overall, this project requires a lot of time, but it's fun. It turned out cute and tasted divine!