Getting a head start

This year for christmas, I've decided to try and do a completely "handmade" christmas, by gifting most, if not all gifts as sewing/quilting/knitting projects made by me. Not only does it make it a personal gift, I can only imagine we'll save some money once the Christmas spending begins.

As there are lots of people we typically buy gifts for, I figure it's never to early to get started! I'm going to try and work in a Christmas gift project in between each project I'm working on. Up first I started with my aunt, who is also my god mother and who we typically buy for. She's quite good in the kitchen and enjoys baking/cooking and crafting. (My mom says that I get my enjoyment of the those three things from her, because they certainly don't come from my mom!)

I decided to do an embroidered apron with her name on it, and 2 coordinating potholders/hotpads.


I made the apron reversible, and embroidered her name on the front of the print side, and then made some double fold bias binding in a bright red that I had that matched the red in the pattern perfectly and used that to make the neck loop and apron strings.

Now, I've never made potholders before, and in my online "research" I found recommendations to use a double layer of batting and a layer of canvas between the two layers of batting to help diffuse the heat, as opposed to buying the batting that helps with heat. This felt great thickness wise, and I think it will do the job of a potholder/hotpad, however it was a beast to quilt! With all those layers, my machine kept skipping stitches and I think I broke/bent 2 needles in the process.

and heres the back of the first potholder:

and heres the second one:

and the back:

These were super easy, I think all three things took me just one evening and the better part of this morning to finish completely. Does anyone have a better way that results in less frustrating quilting of the mammoth stack of fabric on the front? Perhaps I will look into the special batting designed to help with heat...

Tada! One Christmas gift down, a bajillion more to go...Merry Christmas in May!