Christmas on a Budget – Make Your Own Christmas Stockings

Have you seen the price of Christmas stockings?  Not the plain red ones with a bit of fake fur at the top (our kids had these when they were little) and can be picked up at the dollar store.   I’m talking about the really nice ones.  I’ve seen them priced anywhere from $20 on up.

You can make your own stockings that will last for years and not fall apart after a couple of years of use.   And you can do it for a fraction of the cost of the fancy ones you buy in the big box or department stores.

For example, these stockings that I made for the Stocking Drive run by Lyanna of Purple Panda Quilts cost about $6 each.

A few years ago, I decided it was time to replace our children’s little kid stockings with grown up stockings.  I waited for a really good sale on fashion fabrics and I purchased velvet and satin.

I even made two new stockings for Dave and I.

I know… you may be thinking velvet and satin are not cheap fabrics even on sale.  But the great thing about stockings is that each one takes just a little over ½ yard to make.  And if you’re making several stockings, you can mix and match, using scraps leftover from one stocking to trim another stocking.

For example, for Dave’s granddaughter’s first Christmas I made this stocking out of the scraps leftover from making the stockings I made for her father, mother and big brother a couple of years prior (I would have posted pictures of those stockings but I couldn’t find them in any of my files.)

And speaking of scraps, the stocking that I made for the 2011 Stocking Giveaway (link in my sidebar) was made from scraps and batting leftover from other projects.

All of the stockings pictured were made using Butterick pattern #5783.  I’m not sure if it’s still available, but each of the pattern companies will have patterns available (Hancock Fabrics has a sale running right now until the 30th… 99 cents on all McCall’s, Simplicity and Butterick patterns.)

You could also download any one of these patterns (or several others available on-line):

http://www.craftandfabriclinks.com/xmas_stocking/Christmas_stocking_pattern.html

http://www.goodhousekeeping.com/holidays/christmas-ideas/christmas-stockings-craft

http://dsquilts.com/uploads/StockingInstructions.pdf

Or you can trace around a stocking you already have.

Once you’d found the basic stocking pattern that you like, print it out and come back Sunday when I’ll be posting the tutorial for how I made that Quilt As You Go (QAYG) stocking in the last photo.

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