Ugh.

No, that isn’t quite the same as “Bah, humbug!” I like Christmas, I just don’t like seeing all of the decorations before Halloween. Several stores in the mall started to put out their Christmas stuff while it was still technically SUMMER! Isn’t that insane? However, while I don’t like seeing the decorations, I need to start thinking about Christmas if I’m going to finish up the sewing type gifts I want to do. Limited funds, dontcha know. I really don’t have a lot of gifts to give – brother & sister-in-law, mom, grandma, one or two family exchanges, cats… Yes, I give gifts to my cats. Sometimes they reciprocate (and I’m not talking about hairballs). Buttercup could use some new foam stripey balls, and Ru and Malthy would love a new scratching post. If we find a good one, maybe we could even get Buttercup to use it, instead of the three ring binders on the bottom of my cookbook bookshelf. Gee, I hope they don’t read this blog…

What prompted me to think about Christmas was a new design I put together in EQ6. I saw a beautiful star quilt by Toadusew Creative Concepts called Hopeful Beginnings (sorry, I had to remove the link because the pattern is no longer featured on their website). Actually, they have a number of pattens that I just fell in love with! Anyway, this particular wall hanging prompted me to think about designing something with just squares and half square triangles. You can divide it into four identical sections by drawing a vertical and horizontal line. Draw an X and each section is a reflection of the opposite. I thought that was a great place to start, so I played with the concept and came up with a design of my own. It looks nothing like the original – it isn’t even a star – but the name “Christmas Cactus” popped into my head, and I think I’m going to work it up for a pattern. What do you think?

It’s fairly small – about 40″ square, using 1″ squares and half square triangles. I could use 2″ squares, but that would be 72″ square – bigger than I really want to go. I like the idea of it as a wall hanging.