Christmas Time Together

Hi everyone! I hope that you all had a splendid time these past few days. I had a lot of fun with my daughter, husband, and friends here in Florida. Christmas was a blast! I just want to share with you some life things that have been going on.

At the beginning of the month, my daughter started preschool! She is loving it. It is only two mornings a week, but she gets a lot from it. She has two weeks off but asks everyday to go back!

For Christmas, her class did a Nativity. She was a cow :) It was so adorable.

She also had a lot of fun helping me decorate the house for Christmas.

She really enjoyed decorating her own tree. Most of the ornaments are all around the house, but I love her having one of her own :)

My husband used some of his time off to make cookies with her. The girl has such a sweet tooth. They made a ton of gingerbread cookies.

Christmas morning this year was the best one yet! She was really into it this year. It was just precious.

She played with her toys for the morning and we had some friends over at night.

It was the first fire of the season for us. It's been kind of warm here, but it was cold enough to go for it.

I thoroughly enjoyed spending time with loved ones and took in every moment. Happy New Years in advance to you all :)

Felt Trees Continued

Last year I made these, inspired by this. I shared a written explanation of how I made them, but this year I took a few pictures to help give more of a visual of that.

I happened to make three more this year for a gift.

My daughter was very involved with the picture taking.

Especially since the wind kept blowing them down. She was kind enough to keep standing them back up :)

So, last year the ones I made, I used plastic trees that the dollar store had as the base. This year I didn't see any when I went, so I just made some out of cardboard (cereal boxes, etc) in different sizes.

Then I grabbed felt and fleece in a certain color spectrum I liked and a hot glue gun. You can use fabric as well. Alexis, from Made by Lex, made these pretty ones with fabric last year.

And then this is the most random part. I just take a piece and see if it will fit around the base. If it does, I just glue on one end, wrap it around and glue on the other side. Then I trim off the extra at the bottom, the top, and where it meets. I layer as many layers as I like on each tree until at the top.

I then leave the top open a little bit so I can glue in the embroidery thread which is tied onto the pompom.
***I hand made the pom poms. See here for how to do this.

I love how whimsical they are. They now adorn my daughters dresser for part of her bedrooms Christmas decorations.

Upcycled Christmas Gifts: Shirts

I had a lot of fun creating these two shirts for gifts.

It wasn't too hard to do. For each, I used the top of one shirt, cut off the sleeves and the bottom, and cut down the sides to open it up.

Then I used the cut off pieces as patterns to create new pieces to be sewn on. It was a lot easier than starting from scratch. I think the neck can be the hardest part when working with knit fabrics, so if I can skip it, I do :)

It's hard to believe that Christmas is almost here. I really can't believe it. December used to be so slow for me as a child. Now, it goes by so fast I feel like I miss it. But, I am pretty much done with gift making/gift buying. I am procrastinating a bit on some gifts because they won't be handed out to their owners until January, but I am glad to have most things done. Whew!

Quilt Square Scarf Tutorial & Giveaway (Closed)

Have some quilt squares laying around not being put to use? Well, you could make some cute scarves with them.

I had a Moda charm pack (can't find what print this was) that I had sewn up strips of 9 to create a baby blanket. But, I never went further than that.

So, continuing with my "trying to to buy more stuff" thing, I decided to make some scarves with them for Christmas gifts.

It didn't take long at all and now I have three gifts done and a gift to give to one of you :)

What you need:
-9 five inch quilt squares for each scarf
-1/4 yard of flannel fabric for the backing (all of mine came from JoAnn's)
-10 inches of trim for the ends (I used pom pom trimming on all of mine)

1. Sew the squares together, right sides facing, to create a long row.

2. Place the row on the flannel and cut out the exact size of the quilt square row.

3. Place the flannel piece right side facing down and then put the quilt square row on top, right side facing up. Pin together.

4. Sew together down the sides, but leave a good inch or so free at the ends.

5. Pin on the trimming inbetween the 2 pieces of fabric on the ends. Sew the 3 layers together. Then sew up the sides if there is any place left open.


6. Go down the sides and clip towards the seam, making sure not to clip through the seam.

7. Throw in the washer or just wet it really good. Then put it in the dryer to dry.


8. When it comes out, you might have to pick off some threads, but other than that it is done.

They are so cute and they can fit a child or an adult. You just wrap it over in the front. I even joined in on the fun to show you how it would look on an adult.

Giveaway is now CLOSED

These lovely scarf is up for grabs! It's the one my daughter was wearing in the pictures.

To enter, simply leave one comment and an email I can contact you at if you are to win. It's open until it says closed :)

Pattern Winners and a Painting Gift

Well, before I totally forget about this, the winners of the Straight A Skirt Pattern are (using random.org):

1. Jennifer who said, " what an awesome pattern. my little girl would love a skirt like that. i hope i win!"

2. Erin who said, "What a creative range of skirts! These make me glad I'm having a girl. :)"

If you ladies could email me at jessicafediw@yahoo.com with your email addresses, I will get these sent asap. Thanks everyone for entering :)

And now for another Christmas gift I finished up a bit ago. Remember this painting that I did of my daughter?

Well, I made one for my brother and his wife for Christmas.

These are always fun to do and are really quick to do, even with the drying time. You can find the tutorial here.

New Sponsor Highlight: The Toasted Coconut

I would like to introduce you all to the newest sponsor, The Toasted Coconut.


Emily is the creative mastermind behind this Etsy shop and boy does she have some cute stuff! Here are some of my favorites:
How adorable are these dresses?????? She is great at putting prints together.


There is even something for the little boys in your life, like this cute bow tie.


Quite the dapper fellow isn't he?



And there are so many gorgeous vintage inspired accessories. From headbands to necklaces. You must check them out. They make me swoon.


So, if you still need some presents for Christmas, head over to the Toasted Coconut and check out all her amazing products. You can also find Emily on her blog, The Toasted Coconut (where she shares all kinds of neat vintage makeovers to furniture and all), and here on facebook. Thanks Emily for being a sponsor!!!!!