Halloween Ornaments

I was tidying my sewing room and found eight ~4" squares with a Halloween theme in one of my many piles. They were leftovers from Raven and Pumpkin Placemats panels designed by Andrea Tachiera for Northcott Fabrics. I'd made the placemats five and six Halloween seasons ago as described in my blog posts for 10/24/20 and 10/23/19. Four squares on each of the two panels were intended for coasters, which I do not think are needed when there is a placemat. Anyway, I intended to repurpose those "coasters" as ornaments, and yet, they lingered on for years.

It is still Halloween, but even if it were not, I decided to stop shifting those squares around between piles and sew them up. My inspiration was a thought that kept trailing through my brain like an ear worm. The phrase "Give your self the gift of getting this done" is from a YouTube video of Just Get It Done Quilts by Karen Brown. Within the first 3½ minutes of the video Karen showed items she'd been pleased to complete that fit this "gift" category: a pin cushion kit, a decorated tray, a heating pad insert, a small kit she'd been given, and a notebook cover. Sewing something fun and quick is indeed a gift to yourself.

When I cut the images out of the panel, I stayed an ⅛" beyond the outer edge and used a ¼" seam to sew them face to face. Initially, I futzed around in my stash to find a suitable backing a material. I did find black and white checks, like one of the pumpkins, and a few other golds. (I could not help noticing, though, that I had created more piles to clean up.) Then I talked some sense into myself. Just make four ornaments; you do not need eight! I cut 4½" lengths of black grosgrain ribbon to use as hanging loops, centering each at the top between two face-to-face images.

Once I'd sewn along the edges, leaving an opening at the bottom, I turned the ornaments right sides out. I pressed the ¼" seam along each side of the open edge before starting to stuff. That crease makes it easier to whip stitch the opening closed afterward. The spider and bats squares are shown clipped in preparation for the whipstitch phase.

Here they are — SPIDER, BATS, PUMPKINS, and RAVEN — ready to be hung on the china cabinet near the placemats. PUMPKINS is my favorite. SPIDER is my least favorite... ewww!

Today, I should have been using my time to read my book for book club, which meets three days from now. Instead I discovered, cut out, sewed, stuffed, and whipstitched these ornaments and published this blog post. The experience was a guilty pleasure that was indeed a gift I gave myself. I will undoubtedly have to lose some sleep to finish that book before the club meeting, but today was worth it.