Fun new Christmas Stockings

We are in the process of moving to Idaho this summer.  Part of that process is getting rid of stuff and storing things we won't need until then.  When we started putting things into storage the Christmas decorations fell into this category.  Fast forward 4 months and its Christmas time.  My kids are concerned if there are no stockings then Santa will have to cut back on his gift giving.  I was originally going to go target and buy 5 inexpensive mass produced Christmas stockings but decided that was lame.  Regann and I had to go to town last week to do some shopping so we decided to hit the thrift store and see if we could come up with a better idea. 

About 12 years ago I had a pair of jeans that I loved.  You know the pair that fit just perfect and were always comfortable to wear.  I kept them until they were literally in rags.  I still could not part with them so I made them into my Christmas Stocking so I could keep it forever.  We thought about doing the same for the kids.  In fact that's what we did for the girls, however for the boys it just didn't ring true as the best idea so we kept looking.  We then came up with the idea of using shirts and the rest just fell into place.  Regann chose the jeans and scarves for the girls and I found the dress shirts for the boys.

We got home made a pattern and went to work.  The shirts were way easier than the jeans.  We simply cut the shape of the sock out and sowed the edges.  The jeans were a bit more tricky because we had to use the belt loop around the top of the stocking.  It took a few hours but we got them done.  The kids are jazzed and I think they are unique.  They also all look really cool hanging up.  The kids like these much better than their "real" stockings.  Nolahn was thinking next year he could use two and see how that works out.  He is a thinker.