The Finished Stocking...Merry Christmas!

So, for those of you who know me, you know I am not the most crafty person. I do not enjoy sewing or anything of that nature. But one thing I have found I enjoy is needle-pointing. It is a mindless activity you can do while watching episodes of The Office or Friends, and yet it looks like you are actually skilled at something crafty. I have mostly made belts - even making Kan a UT belt for his 30th birthday (definitely a Round 2 gift as I did not want to spend that much time on a gift during Round 1:). I was talking with my best friend after Miyako was born and saying how I wanted to needlepoint her something. She had also recently had a baby and was doing a tooth fairy pillow for her little one. She did tooth fairy pillows for her boys as well. So, one day in the late spring of 2009, my mom and I went to the needlepoint store and I decided to do a stocking for Miyako. However, I did not choose a small and basic stocking. I chose the largest and most detailed stocking known to man. But it is a mindless activity I thought, and we watch lots of football in our house, so I knew I could finish it by Christmas of 2009.

I took it on the annual Faulkner Family vacation and my cousin-in-law and I both worked on our babies' Christmas stockings. She finished hers...mine still had some work to do. In October of 2009 Kan and I spent four weeks in Japan to "check it out" and I thought I would finish it, only to find out I ran out of some yarn and needed to purchase more upon returning to Lexington. When we got home, I went to the store to get more yarn and asked the lady if I were to bring the stocking in by Thanksgiving, would it be ready for Christmas. She responded in her sweet southern voice, "Oh honey, we start our Christmas orders in July. If you wanted it ready by Christmas you should have finished it by the summer." Really? I wish they had told me this when I bought it, but nonetheless, this gave me more time. I knew for sure I could finish it by summer of 2010. I had plenty of time!

Well, life turned crazy at that point. We came home from Japan, and a few weeks later made the decision to move here for a couple of years to try it out. We spent a week in Knoxville at Christmas and I was so bummed I forgot the stocking to work on, but I was not too concerned about it since I knew I had so much time. To make a long story short, I finally finished the stocking tonight! WOOHOO! The pressure was on. I had been putting it off by reading great books at night, but then our friends decided to come visit us, and I knew I simply had to finish it so they could take it back to Lexington. I am proud to say, the stocking will board a plane on Sunday July 4th and hopefully within the week it will be at the needlepoint store to become a complete stocking. Then in September, it will board a plane back to Japan from Lexington with my folks and come December, it will hang proudly from these little hooks dispersed on our living room wall for pictures that we do not have right now.

What was I thinking making a stocking so big and so detailed? The Santa I know does not have enough toys to fill it up! I should have stuck with a tooth fairy pillow. I also knows this means any other children we have also must have a stocking of the same caliber. Maybe I will even make one for Kan and I one of these days. But it was well worth it. This is something Miyako can keep forever, or until she makes stockings for her own family, and in spite of how long it took me, I cannot wait to see it hung from the chimney with care...or little hooks on the living room wall in our situation in Tokyo.