Reindeer Christmas

Every Christmas I create my own gifts to give to my family members. I usually strive to surpass last year gifts I made. This year was no exception but I think I might have bit off more than I can chew… yeah… I think I did…

This year, I decided to making cute standing reindeer that measure 22 in tall, 5 in wide, 12 in long. These reindeer are definitely 4 times bigger then the army of penguins I made last year (you can see here) which means a lot more material and sewing. I knew at this point I had a lot of work ahead of me so I decided to start working on them back in July!

Just because I started making the reindeer back in July, doesn’t mean I got them done sooner. Ooohh no…. I ran into different types of hurdles while creating them which felt like I went from one disaster to another disaster… I guess it’s pretty typical for me to run into problems, I can’t avoid them at all.

When I started making these reindeer, I started out cutting all the pattern pieces out for all 25 of these reindeer. Let me tell you, there was a lot of fabric to be cut and many of the pieces were small. Boy was I in for a treat because this process of cutting fabric wasn’t a one day ordeal. Nope, I had to break it up into a few days or so. Cut out a certain amount of pieces for a couple of hours then take a break or get errands done. Come back home from work and cut a few more pieces out then watch some TV to unwind for the night. Another day I would cut some more pieces… you get the idea.

What I thought would take me a few days, ended up taking me about a month but hey, I was in no hurry its only August now, there is plenty of time. It’s okay to skip a few days of working on the reindeer here and there. Nothing will go wrong… smh.

To add to my timeline, I decided to use my embroidery machine and program to make the eyes for the reindeer. I really wanted to add thay extra touch to make them look adorable.

Cute right? To make 25 pair of eyes though, adds more time but it was well worth it in the end. You will see later on. 😋

After I thought I was done cutting all the pattern pieces I decided to sew the smaller pieces together first, like the ears, tails, and hooves this way I will feel like I’m accomplishing a lot. When I got to sewing the hooves though, I realized about half way I didn’t have enough pieces cut out… how did this happen? I swear I cut enough. Then I realized I did not calculate correctly…ugh… I forgot I needed a total of eight hooves per reindeer (4 legs × 2 sides of each leg = 8 total hooves needed per reindeer). Well for some reason I think my mind thought 4 legs × 25 reindeer = 100 hooves needed when really I needed 200 (4 legs × 2 sides × 25 reindeer = 200). Yup, that is exactly what happened and now I’m back to cutting fabric. 100 hooves…great…

Below is a video of me sewing antlers together and also demonstrates my average speed I sewed while creating the Reindeer:

 

Here is a picture with all the pieces laid out. You can see I sewed all the hooves on the leg pieces, ears and tail pieces sewn, and sewn the eyes.

Around this time frame, I found out that I had to go on travel for a month for work. Well great, this changes my time line quit a bit… But hey, I had the opportunity to go see Scotland and Portugal which were really beautiful places. Check out my blog post about my trip here.

With this slight delay in my sewing time line, I was feeling the pressure. I really need to get these reindeer completed. Back to sewing I went.

I have to disclose, when I got back from my month long trip my husband found out he has to go on travel to Florida in a couple of weeks for work (beginning of November) and be there for about 4 to 6 months (depending how quickly they get the job done). 😭😭😭 This sucks, but I’m sorry to say that this was kind of a blessing in disguise because now I won’t have any distractions from sewing. Sorry hubby, I love you so much but sometimes I have a hard time completing sewing projects since we end up spending time doing other projects with you or just spending time together in general. Trust me it sucks you are gone but I want to get these reindeer done since time is ticking and it’s not stopping.

To add more to my stress, I decided to buy small wooden crates that I wanted to paint and decorate.

I had a vision to paint the crates silver but with a hammered look. This would make them look like metal vice wood. I found that Rustoleum sells a spray or paint on version of the Hammered look.

Rust-Oleum Universal Spray Paint, 12 oz, Hammered Silver

Rust-Oleum Hammered Metal Finish, Silver, 1-Quart

I went to my local hardware store and bought the spray version, but you had to really spray a lot in order to get the look. So I went on Amazon.com and bought the paint on version because it seemed cost effective. One can of spray paint cost about $6.00 and at the time the paint on version cost $16.00 for 1 quart. Hmm… I’m going to go with the paint on. The one thing I didn’t account for was the time… It took me about 30 minutes to paint one crate and I have to paint 25 of these!! 😣

Somehow I thought it would be awesome to make something nice for the Reindeer to stand in that my family could also use to decorate for Christmas every year. I have to say, what the hell was I thinking?! At the time I thought I would have plenty of time, nope, I definitely made it worst for myself. More time crunching… ugh…

If you have to know, I did finish the crates on time. They turned out better then I thought.

Fast forward, it’s now the beginning of December and I have two weeks before hubby and I are going on vacation and driving to Ohio. Can you imagine, I still don’t have the Reindeer done. 😟 Yeah I know, what a nightmare. At this point I had a bag full of stuffed reindeer heads that I still need to hand sew antlers and ears on:

And a stack of sewn bodies that still needed bottom of feet sewn on and to be stuffed:

Let’s say I was in a slight panic. Okay, I was in full panic mode and super stressed. I had to tell myself that I will get it done, just take it day by day. You can do it!

A week before vacation I surprisingly got 16 of them done! Woohoo! Only 9 more to go! At this point I was relieved because I knew I am capable of completing them all before going on vacation.

I have to show you since I can’t wait, so here were the 16 reindeer I completed at this point:

Aren’t they precious?

At this point I felt so accomplished that I got 16 done in a week that I thought nothing will go wrong. HA! Here I go, thinking it is a perfect world, well guess what, my timeline got shortened 😧… To add more to my stress, my awesome hubby decided he didn’t want us to drive to Ohio but instead fly… what!?

My first thought was, are you kidding me? How in the world am I going to get the Christmas presents I spent so much time making to Ohio now?😰

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My husband gave me his Pros and Cons about flying verses driving:

Pros for Flying	Cons for Flying
•Don’t have to drive in snow (since it’s that time of year)	• Flight can get delayed or worst canceled
• Don’t have to drive in traffic and drive through the mountains	• Won’t be able to pack Christmas presents or bring Christmas presents back home if we fly
• Shorter trip (driving can take about 10 to 12 hours or more)	• Cost more money to fly vice driving
• Less stressful and more relaxing because we don’t have to drive(more for me since I’m the one that ends up driving the whole way not hubby. Hubby hates driving especially in bad weather…)
• Hubby is currently a Sky Priority member on Delta (due to traveling and flying a lot for work) so we can check in quicker for flight and be one of the first to be on the plane

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I do like the idea of flying instead of driving since it would be less stress for me. No crazy drivers, no traffic, and I would have more of a set schedule. My main concern though is figuring out how I am going to get Christmas presents to Ohio if we are going to fly.

🤔 I don’t have anything big enough to pack the Reindeer and crates in my luggage so taking them on the plane is out of the question. The only other thing that comes to mind is shipping the Reindeer to Ohio. 💵 This seems to be the only plausible way, so now we need a box big enough to fit the crates and the Reindeer… I know we definitely didn’t have any box big enough to fit everything at the house so I challenged hubby to find one.

Hubby accepted the challenge and came home the next day with a huge box that he stuffed in the back of his car. I’m really surprised that he got that box in his car… The box measured 21in X 24in X 31in.

Cross fingers this box is big enough. I guess I will find out later when I finish the rest of the Reindeer. My goal is to complete them all two days before we fly so we can ship them and have them arrive before Christmas. You know what that means, I have about four days to complete nine Reindeer. No problem, right? Wrong!

To keep it short and sweet I had a couple of appointments that were scheduled after I got off work that I almost forgot about so this of course shorten my sewing time… But you know what, even with these hurdles I still completed the Reindeer in time!! YAY!!

Poor Reindeer they are very squished in that box. 🙁🙁

All ready to ship this box to Ohio for Christmas!!

I have to apologize, due to me finishing these reindeer last minute I forgot to take a picture of all the Reindeer together! 😔 But I do have a few pictures I was able to get when I did remember:

Oh, almost forgot, do you like the cute scraves I added? The reindeer seem to be missing something so I made different plaid scarves using fabric my friend from work gave me. 😙 Thanks Gabby! (Litterly made the scarves night before I shipped Reindeer and didn’t have time to put them on until the reindeer were delivered.)

Thanks for stopping by! Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!