Wow, these last two weeks have just flown by. I’ve been so busy in my sewing room that I think I see smoke coming from the machines.

I’ve made a wall hanging for my daughter’s birthday, (oops, I fogot to photograph it again when it was completely finished).

a wall hanging for my front door,

four memory bears for my children from my brother’s shirts, and a Bible bag for my granddaughter Last summer, when the Great Hunter and I got together with my brother-in-law, he gave me a box full of shirts that belonged to my brother, his husband. I left them in that box for several months and then finally got the courage to go through them and choose which ones I wanted to use to make memory bears. I ended up taking all but about six of the shirts to the local Catholic charity, and the rest I put back in the box. I knew I wanted to make the bears for Christmas, but it was really, really hard to take each one of those shirts out of the box (and they still smelled so very nice) and cut them apart. It was even harder to figure out what personalization I wanted on them. In the past I’ve used the phrase “Alive in Our Heart” but somehow I knew that wouldn’t work. I also knew that I could not put his name on them either. So I settled for just his initials and a broken heart.  I shed more than a few tears making these.

Along with all the sewing I have been doing, I’ve also been singing a lot with my regular church choir practice, and last weekend’s Boar’s Head Festival at the church where I grew up.

I know I’ve written about Boar’s Head once or twice before. Last year, when I knew I just couldn’t handle a typical Christmas, I decided to sing with Immanuel’s adult choir for their performance of the Boar’s Head Festival.

I enjoyed it so much that I did it again this year. We performed six times over four days, and what a wonderful experience that was. The songs are still running through my head. In my post of December 15, 2021, I described the Boar’s Head Festival as:

The colorful Boar’s Head ceremony became part of the Christmas celebration in the great manor houses of the Middle Ages, but had its roots in pagan times when the boar was the first dish served at a Roman feast.  The Church endowed the custom with symbolic Christian meaning and elevated it to the service of God, enriching the lives of all it touched.  Sponsored by the Lord of the Manor, the ceremony became a service of praise to Jesus Christ, Lord of the Universe and Redeemer of the World. https://peaceboarshead.org/what-is-a-festival/

Now all I’ve got left to do is some last-minute shopping, all the wrapping, touch-ups on my projects, some baking and maybe some house cleaning if I get around to it.