day 173: reindeer noses and a mug rug

day 173 and i am feeling particularly crafty today so i made two pinterest creations!

the finished reindeer noses treat bags

the first, of course, involves reindeer ... even more precisely reindeer noses!  i absolutely loved this idea for the kids to give their mates for christmas favours.  zoe from a personal touch made these little goody bags for a craft stall and made the beautiful bag toppers.  i decided to go with these amazing bag toppers from kate hatfield that are freely downloadable and you can have them plain or with text.  i went with the plain ones so i could customise them to be used for reindeer nose toppers :)  then simply add 8 brown noses to the bag and one red one (can't forget rudolf!).  staple together and you have some great gifts for the kids to hand out to their friends.

what you need :)

a finished treat bag :)

the second creation i made today was another xmas mug rug.  i was totally inspired by this one amy made at increasingly domestic.  amy has a wonderful tutorial for achieving this christmas mug rug step by step. i loved the simplicity of it but as i don't own a rotary cutter i decided it would be helpful to my less than straight sewing if i created a paper piecing pattern to achieve this!

my pattern for the mug rug!

once i had the pattern done, it has down to the sewing machine to put it all together!

finished ... and my pattern worked for paper piecing!

we of course had to try it out and see if it worked!

outcome:  both of these creations were pinned to my christmas is coming board and i am absolutely delighted with both!  they both came together easily and were a joy to make.

my sincere thanks to zoe, kate, and amy for all of today's inspiration that had me filling, printing, cutting, and sewing to complete some truly awesome christmas creations :)